100 Protest Police Killing of Latino Man in San Francisco

Courthouse News

As protests over a police shooting subsided in Ferguson, Mo. on Friday, more than 100 people gathered outside the San Francisco Federal Courthouse to protest the police killing of Alex Nieto, who was shot to death in March. In a lawsuit filed Friday, the family doubts the police version of the shooting.     Alejandro "Alex" Nieto, 28, was killed in Bernal Heights Park on March 21 after someone called police about an armed man in the area. Nieto, a security guard and a City College student, was equipped with a Taser.     Police say Nieto defied orders and pointed the Taser at them when they approached.     But his parents claim in a federal lawsuit that an independent investigation reveals a different story.     After filing the lawsuit, the Nietos' attorney, John Burris, appeared at a rally outside the courthouse, when many of the more than 100 people in attendance held signs and wore T-shirts with Nieto's face on it.     "Police in various cities are engaged in Wild West conduct," Burris told the crowd. "The only way to control this is you have to sue them."     Burris said that the San Francisco Police Department has not been cooperative in releasing information, and still has not released the names of the officers involved in the killing.     Nieto's parents filed a claim with San Francisco in April, which the city rejected in May, "without providing a scintilla of information as to why," according to the lawsuit.     According to the lawsuit, the events unfolded like this: Nieto left home the night he was killed to go to his job as a security guard for a nearby restaurant. He bought a burrito on the way, and ate it on a bench at Bernal Heights Park. While he was in the park, someone called the police, saying that Nieto had a black gun on his hip. This was actually a black and yellow Taser Nieto legally carried for his job.     When police arrived, Nieto was walking down a jogging trail near the park's entrance. Several officers were there, one of whom, from behind a patrol car, ordered Nieto to stop.     "Within seconds a quick volley of bullets were fired at Nieto," the lawsuit states. "No additional orders or any other verbal communication was heard between the first officer yelling 'stop' and the initial volley of gunfire."     Afterward, police said Nieto did not follow orders to show his hands, but pointed his Taser as the officers. But an independent investigation led by Burris and community members found witnesses who contradict the authorities' story, according to the lawsuit.     At the rally, Burris called the police narrative "flat-out wrong."     "Lies!" yelled someone from the crowd.     The lawsuit claims that the SFPD has a pattern of using excessive force against citizens. Since 2000 there have been 97 officer-involved shootings, in which 33 people have died.     "There was no basis to shoot him, and they essentially shot him to pieces, I'm sorry to say," Burris said.     The San Francisco Bay Guardian reported shortly after the shooting that during a town hall meeting, SFPD Chief Greg Suhr claimed that when officers asked Nieto to show his hands, he pulled a Taser from his holster.     Nieto also verbally challenged officers when they asked him to drop his weapon, the chief said.     The San Francisco Police Department did not return a call for comment on Friday.     The defendants in the Nietos' lawsuit are the City and County of San Francisco, and Police Chief Suhr.     Nieto's parents, Refugio and Elvira, demand punitive damages for wrongful death, violation of the Fourth Amendment, other civil rights charges, battery, negligence, and funeral expenses.

Starve or surrender: Cut off all food and water to Gaza, says Israeli general

CLG

The US complains about ISIS? US tax dollars are funding Israel's *daily* war crimes and 9/11s in Gaza: Starve or surrender: Cut off all food and water to Gaza, says Israeli general 23 Aug 2014 Israeli Major-General Giora Eiland has urged that all food and water be cut off to Gaza's nearly 1.8 million Palestinian residents -- a major war crime and precisely the "starve or surrender" policy which the United States has condemned when used in Syria. Eiland, the Israeli government's former national security advisor, argues that Gaza should be considered an enemy "state." "Since Gaza is in fact a state in a military confrontation with us, the proper way to put pressure on them is to bring to a full stop the supplies from Israel to Gaza, not only of electricity and fuel, but also of food and water," he wrote in a Hebrew-language op-ed on Mako, a website affiliated with Israel's Channel 2 television.

60% of White People Believe Police Officers are Honest

Gallup

White Party [Republicans] More Focused on Immigration [non-whites] as their Top Problem

Gallup

Republicans and Democrats generally share concerns about dysfunctional government, the economy, and jobs as top problems facing the country, but they differ on immigration, moral decline, poverty, and education.

White Party [Republicans] Scores Big Victory In Their Battle To Keep Florida Gerrymandered

ThinkProgress

It all seemed so promising. Last month, a Florida trial judge declared the state’s congressional maps, one of the most gerrymandered maps in the nation, in violation of the state’s constitution. In 2012, Florida voters narrowly preferred President Obama to his Republican opponent Mitt Romney. Yet Florida’s congressional maps enabled Republicans to capture 17 of the state’s 27 congressional districts. Judge Terry P. Lewis’s opinion offered hope that, come the next election, Florida could have a congressional delegation that looked a bit more like Florida.

On Friday, however, Lewis threw cold water on these hopes. Responding to Lewis’s order to redraw the state’s maps, Florida’s GOP-controlled legislature responded with new maps that make only minor changes to the old ones. Lewis’s Friday order approves these new maps, and it also holds that the 2014 election may proceed using the old maps. So Florida Republicans will get to run two full elections using maps that were declared unconstitutional. And, when the new maps take effect in 2016, they will make only minor changes to the existing gerrymander.

Admittedly, Lewis’s original decision declaring the congressional maps unconstitutional does suggest that the state would receive only limited relief from gerrymandering. The plaintiffs in this case challenge nine of Florida’s congressional districts as unconstitutional gerrymanders, Lewis only struck down two — Districts 5 & 10. But Lewis’s original opinion did suggest that the state would need to undo at least part of the GOP-friendly gerrymander that governed elections in 2012. District 5 is a worm-like thing that snakes from the northeast corner of the state down near its midpoint. District 10 had an “odd-shaped appendage which wraps under and around District 5, running between District 5 and 9,” according to Judge Lewis. This meant that they violated a rule prohibiting districts that “have an unusual shape, a bizarre design, or an unnecessary appendage”

Moreover, as Lewis noted, Districts 5, 7, 9 and 10 were shaped the way they are, at least in part, because a GOP political consultant suggested the be redrawn to transform them “from being four Democratic performing or leaning seats in early maps . . . to two Democratic and two Republican performing seats in the enacted map.” His original opinion, in other words, suggested that the state would need redraw the maps in a way that would likely transform two Republican districts into Democratic districts.

Data suggests that the new maps may not produce a result that is very different than the old maps, however. One reason the old maps were such a successful gerrymander, for example, is that they packed a large number of African American voters — voters who tend to prefer Democrats — into the worm-like District 5. Under the old maps, about 50 percent of District 5′s voters are black. Meanwhile, just 10 percent of the voters in District 10 are black. Under the new maps, 48 percent of District 5′s voters will be African Americans, and 12 percent of District 10′s voters will also be black.

This tweak may be enough to make Rep. Daniel Webster (R-FL), who represents the 10th District, work harder in 2016. Webster won his race by a little over 3 points in 2012. But African American turnout was also unusually high in 2012, in no small part because America’s first black president was running what is almost certain to be the last race of his political career. President Obama will not be on the ballot in 2016.

Judge Lewis, for his part, explained in his order upholding the new maps that “[t]he Legislature is only required to produce a map that meets the requirements of the Constitution,” and his “‘duty’ is not to select the best plan, but rather to decide whether the one adopted by the Legislature is valid.” If Florida’s new maps are valid, however, then that suggests that Florida’s constitutional safeguards against gerrymandering are much weaker than they once appeared.

The plaintiffs in this lawsuit say they plan to appeal Judge Lewis’s most recent ruling.

The post Republicans Score Big Victory In Their Battle To Keep Florida Gerrymandered appeared first on ThinkProgress.

“The American public is expecting the Justice Department to hold the banks accountable for its misdeeds in the mortgage meltdown. But these tax write-offs shift the burden back onto taxpayers and send the wrong message by treating parts of the settlement as an ordinary business expense.”

BlackListed News

Presented to the public as a victory for the Justice Department who negotiated the deal on behalf of the government, details of the BofA settlement—as with previous high-profile agreements with Citibank and JPMorgan—offer a clear view of how large banks have avoided responsibility for the behavior that sent the global economy into a tailspin just six years ago. (Photo: Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

It's not nothing, say critics, but the U.S. government's announced $16.65 billion settlement with Bank of America announced on Thursday—so far the largest associated with the Wall Street-fueled mortgage malpractice that led to the 2008 financial meltdown—is more stage-acting than justice and more business-as-usual than real punishment.

Presented to the public as a victory for the Justice Department who negotiated the deal on behalf of the government, details of the BofA settlement—as with previous high-profile agreements with Citibank and JPMorgan—offer a clear view of how large banks have avoided responsibility for the behavior that sent the global economy into a tailspin just six years ago. Much of the money—as much as $7 billion of it—is not paid in cash as a fine, but is instead included as "soft money" in which banks are credited for writing down existing mortgages. Other large portions of the settlement are allowed to serve as business expenses which allows the banks to exploit them as tax write-offs.

Speaking with the New York Times about the settlement, Phineas Baxandall, an analyst with the public advocacy group U.S. PIRG, said, “The American public is expecting the Justice Department to hold the banks accountable for its misdeeds in the mortgage meltdown. But these tax write-offs shift the burden back onto taxpayers and send the wrong message by treating parts of the settlement as an ordinary business expense.”

Following announcement of the deal, the stock price of the bank—one of the nation's largest—rose four points.

How the New York Times Twists Gaza

FAIR

Though it has faded somewhat from the headlines, Israel's war on Gaza is still going on, with a round of airstrikes that killed dozens this week.  And how was this reported in the New York Times? As Hamas breaking a cease-fire agreement.

Jodi Rudoren's dispatch (8/21/14) begins with a rather astonishing lead:

Hamas is the party that keeps extending this summer's bloody battle in the Gaza Strip, repeatedly breaking temporary truces and vowing to endlessly fire rockets into Israel until its demands are met.

The idea that it has been Hamas that has "repeatedly" broken cease-fire agreements is deeply misleading. An August 1 agreement, for instance, broke down under disputed circumstances (FAIR Blog, 8/6/14), with Hamas claiming that its attack on Israeli soldiers inside Gaza came before the cease-fire was to start. The Israeli reaction was a massive attack on Rafah that killed dozens.

But declaring Hamas to be the party that rejects good faith efforts to stop the fighting is common (Electronic Intifada, 7/15/14), while little attention is paid to Hamas offers of a cease-fire or truce, one of which came very early in the war (Mondoweiss, 7/16/14).  And when there is evidence that Israel has violated a new cease-fire agreement–as was the case on August 4–media reports do their best to obscure this fact (FAIR Blog, 8/6/14).

On a more fundamental level, Israel's insistence on maintaining a blockade on Gaza is itself an act of war–meaning that most discussions about "ending" the conflict are really about how to extend a state of war against Gaza.

As is often the case, what caused this week's breakdown is in dispute. As the Guardian reported (8/19/14):

Israel accused Hamas of violating the latest of a series of temporary ceasefires after rockets were launched from Gaza, triggering a swift military and political response. More than 25 airstrikes hit Gaza in response to rocket fire, killing a woman and a two-year-old girl, and wounding at least 15 others in Gaza City.

The paper added: "The Hamas spokesman in Gaza, Sami Abu Zuhri, denied knowledge of the rocket fire which Israel said had breached the truce."

Whatever the immediate cause, the effect has been another round of devastating attacks. But in the Times, not only was Hamas to blame, but they also wanted readers to know that this round of attacks was especially careful:

In contrast to the earlier phase of the war, Israel this week deployed its extensive intelligence capabilities and overwhelming firepower in targeted bombings with limited civilian casualties less likely to raise the world's ire. [MORE]

Israel Kills Wife and Baby Son of Hamas Leader

4th Media

In an action that can only be described as a terrorist murder, Israeli warplanes killed the wife and baby son of Hamas military commander Mohammed Deif, in a targeted air strike Tuesday night.

A Hamas spokesman confirmed the deaths of Widad Deif, 28 years old, and her baby son Ali, eight months, along with a third victim whose body was pulled from the rubble of the home in Gaza City. Palestinian sources told the media that the third victim was not Mohammed Deif, who has been the target of repeated Israeli assassination attempts over the past decade. Widad’s three other children by Deif were injured in the attack but reportedly survived.

Eyewitnesses to the Tuesday night attack said that Israeli F-16 warplanes, supplied by the United States, dropped five bombs, destroying a three-story building, also killing the wife and two teenage sons of the building’s owner, Raba al-Dalo.

NONSTOP Provocations as Pretexts FOR Imperial War: From Pearl Harbor to 9/11

4th Media

Wars in an imperialist democracy cannot simply be dictated by executive fiat, they require the consent of highly motivated masses who will make the human and material sacrifices. Imperialist leaders have to create a visible and highly charged emotional sense of injustice and righteousness to secure national cohesion and overcome the natural opposition to early death, destruction and disruption of civilian life and to the brutal regimentation that goes with submission to absolutist rule by the military.

The need to invent a cause is especially the case with imperialist countries because their national territory is not under threat. There is no visible occupation army oppressing the mass of the people in their everyday life. The ‘enemy’ does not disrupt everyday normal life – as forced conscription would and does. Under normal peaceful time, who would be willing to sacrifice their constitutional rights and their participation in civil society to subject themselves to martial rule that precludes the exercise of all their civil freedoms?

The task of imperial rulers is to fabricate a world in which the enemy to be attacked (an emerging imperial power like Japan) is portrayed as an ‘invader’ or an ‘aggressor’ in the case of revolutionary movements (Korean and Indo-Chinese communists) engaged in a civil war against an imperial client ruler or a ‘terrorist conspiracy’ linked to an anti-imperialist, anti-colonial Islamic movements and secular states.

Imperialist-democracies in the past did not need to consult or secure mass support for their expansionist wars; they relied on volunteer armies, mercenaries and colonial subjects led and directed by colonial officers. Only with the confluence of imperialism, electoral politics and total war did the need arise to secure not only consent, but also enthusiasm, to facilitate mass recruitment and obligatory conscription.

Since all US imperial wars are fought ‘overseas’ – far from any immediate threats, attacks or invasions – -US imperial rulers have the special task of making the ‘causus bellicus’ immediate, ‘dramatic’ and self-righteously ‘defensive’.

To this end US Presidents have created circumstances, fabricated incidents and acted in complicity with their enemies, to incite the bellicose temperament of the masses in favor of war.

The pretext for wars are acts of provocation which set in motion a series of counter-moves by the enemy, which are then used to justify an imperial mass military mobilization leading to and legitimizing war.

State ‘provocations’ require uniform mass media complicity in the lead-up to open warfare: Namely the portrayal of the imperial country as a victim of its own over-trusting innocence and good intentions.

All four major US imperial wars over the past 67 years resorted to a provocation, a pretext, and systematic, high intensity mass media propaganda to mobilize the masses for war. An army of academics, journalists, mass media pundits and experts ‘soften up’ the public in preparation for war through demonological writing and commentary: Each and every aspect of the forthcoming military target is described as totally evil – hence ‘totalitarian’ – in which even the most benign policy is linked to demonic ends of the regime.

Since the ‘enemy to be’ lacks any saving graces and worst, since the ‘totalitarian state’ controls everything and everybody, no process of internal reform or change is possible. Hence the defeat of ‘total evil’ can only take place through ‘total war’. The targeted state and people must be destroyed in order to be redeemed. In a word, the imperial democracy must regiment and convert itself into a military juggernaut based on mass complicity with imperial war crimes. The war against ‘totalitarianism’ becomes the vehicle for total state control for an imperial war.

In the case of the US-Japanese war, the US-Korean war, the US-Indochinese war and the post-September 11 war against an independent secular nationalist regime (Iraq) and the Islamic Afghan republic, the Executive branch (with the uniform support of the mass media and congress) provoked a hostile response from its target and fabricated a pretext as a basis for mass mobilization for prolonged and bloody wars. [MORE]

NY Cops Arrested for Drug Trafficking and Protecting Drug Dealer

BlackListed News

In a New York federal court this week, former Sheriff’s Deputy Charles Fuller pleaded guilty to one count of attempting to aid and abet the possession of cocaine with intent to distribute. Deputy Fuller admitted to accepting protection money to transport a drug dealer along with suspected packages of cocaine while off-duty. Unbeknownst to Fuller, the drug dealer was an FBI confidential informant. 

On February 19, the FBI informant paid Deputy Fuller $1,000 to safely transport him and 250 grams of cocaine from Albany to Warren County. After completing the trip, Fuller agreed to transport the drug dealer again on February 27. Fuller raised the price to $4,000 because the informant would be carrying a kilogram of cocaine this time.

Instead of using cocaine, the FBI gave the informant a kilogram of a white powder that looked similar to the drug. Since Fuller never inspected the packages, he had no idea that FBI agents were preparing to arrest him. They placed Fuller in custody and recovered the $5,000 in marked bills that their informant had paid him.

Did the US Create ISIS?

4th Media

New Bill In Congress Would Ban Private Citizens From Owning Body Armor

BlackListedNews.com 

A new law that has been introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives "would prohibit the sale, transfer or possession of military-level body armor by civilians". In other words, private citizens all over the entire nation would be permanently banned from owning body armor if this bill gets passed and signed into law.

Ferguson Feeds Off the Poor: Three Warrants a Year Per Household

DailyBeast

In the chamber where Officer Darren Wilson received a commendation six months before killing Michael Brown, a minor court generates major money from the city’s poor and working people.

The Ferguson Police have now released a video that shows police Officer Darren Wilson receiving a commendation six months before he became known to the whole nation as the cop who gunned down an unarmed 18-year-old.

The irony is obvious to anyone who watches the footage of this proud young officer receiving the award at a ceremony in the City Council chamber as Ferguson’s six council members applaud.

“Officer Wilson, in recognition of outstanding police work while investigating a suspicious-vehicle call,” Chief Thomas Jackson says in making the presentation. “Acting alone, you struggled with one subject and [were] able to gain control of the subject and his car keys until assistance arrived. Later, during the interview, it was discovered that the subject was breaking down a large quantity of marijuana for sale.”

Jackson adds, “Great job, Darren.”

But there is another, unnoticed irony in the venue itself. Three times a month—one day and two nights—the City Council chamber also serves as home to the incredibly busy and extremely profitable Ferguson municipal court.

A report issued just last week by the nonprofit lawyer’s group ArchCity Defenders notes that in the court’s 36 three-hour sessions in 2013, it handled 12,108 cases and 24,532 warrants. That is an average of 1.5 cases and three warrants per Ferguson household. Fines and court fees for the year in this city of just 21,000 people totaled $2,635,400.

The sum made the municipal court the city’s second-biggest source of revenue. It also almost certainly was a major factor in the antagonism between the police and the citizenry preceding the tragedy that resulted when Wilson had another encounter with a subject six months after he got his commendation.

And any complete investigation into how Michael Brown came to be sprawled dead in the street with a half-dozen bullet wounds must consider not just the cop but the system he served, a system whose primary components include a minor court that generates major money, much of it from poor and working people.

Five of the six City Council members who meet in this chamber are white, even though the city itself is more than 70 percent black. The City Council appoints the municipal judge, currently Ron Brockmeyer, who is also white.

But when this same chamber serves as Ferguson Municipal Court, a disproportionate number of the defendants are black.

The immediate explanation is that the bulk of the cases arise from car stops. The ArchCity Defenders report notes: “Whites comprise 29% of the population of Ferguson but just 12.7% of vehicle stops. After being stopped in Ferguson, blacks are almost twice as likely as whites to be searched (12.1% vs. 6.9%) and twice as likely to be arrested (10.4% vs. 5.2%).”

Lest anyone contend that blacks inherently merit greater police attention than whites, the report offers another statistic.

“Searches of black individuals result in discovery of contraband only 21.7% of the time, while similar searches of whites produce contraband 34.0% of the time.”

That would suggest both that whites were more likely to be stopped when there was actual probable cause and that blacks were more likely to be stopped when there was not. And the antagonism sure to be generated by such racial disparities was magnified by the sheer number of cases.

The report cites a court employee as saying the docket for a typical three-hour court session has up to 1,500 cases. The report goes on to say that “in addition to such heavy legal prosecution,” the Ferguson court and others like it in nearby towns “engage in a number of operational procedures that make it even more difficult for defendants to navigate the courts.”

The report goes on, “For example, a Ferguson court employee reported that the bench routinely starts hearing cases 30 minutes before the appointed time and then locks the doors to the building as early as five minutes after the official hour, a practice that could easily lead a defendant arriving even slightly late to receive an additional charge for failure to appear.”

The lawyers of ArchCity Defenders specialize in representing the indigent and the homeless. They noticed that many of their clients had multiple warrants on minor charges issued by municipal courts in Ferguson and the other 80 municipalities in St. Louis County that have their own courts and police.

“They didn’t just have one case, they had 10 cases,” says Thomas Harvey, the organization’s 44-year-old executive director.

The warrants too often precluded the clients from securing shelter and services, and access to job programs. The lawyers sought some remedy in the issuing courts.

“It kept being about the money,” Harvey recalls. “We were telling the court, ‘They don’t have any money because they’re homeless.’”

Cop In Ferguson Who Yelled "I Will F--king Kill You" Removed from Race Soldier Duty

ThinkProgress

A police officer that threatened to kill unarmed protesters in Ferguson Tuesday night has been removed from duty after ACLU of Missouri sent a letter to Colonel Ronald Replogle, who serves as superintendent for Missouri’s State Highway Patrol.

The officer was caught on livestream yelling “I will fucking kill you” to protesters in Ferguson. When asked to identify himself, the officer refused and said “go fuck yourself,” instead. 

ACLU of Missouri’s letter stated:

[T]his officer’s conduct—from pointing a weapon, to threatening to kill, to responding with profanity to a request for identity—was from start to finish wholly unacceptable. Such behavior serves to heighten, not reduce, tension.

ACLU-Missouri tweeted that the officer has been removed from duty Wednesday: 

SUCCESS! In response to our letter, officer who threatened to kill #Ferguson protesters has been removed from duty https://t.co/53WP8Ht0Mu

— ACLU of Missouri (@aclu_mo) August 20, 2014

Obama Pissed about Iraq, Neutral on Ferguson- then goes Golfing

NYDailyNews

The vacationing commander-in-chief, after promising a relentless hunt for the terrorist butchers of a U.S. journalist, teed off on a Martha’s Vineyard golf course just a short time later.

NYPD Accused of Coverup in Death of Japanese Student

ColorLines

Meanwhile, back in New York City…yet another questionable death at the hands of NYPD. Ryo Oyamada, a 24-year-old from Japan who was studying in the U.S., was struck and killed by a speeding patrol car in February 2013. At the time, NYPD said the police cruiser was rushing to respond to a 911 call and had its sirens flashing. Now, more than a year later, evidence emerges that contradicts that account and strongly suggests a coverup to avoid holding the officer accountable in Oyamada’s death, Gothamist reports.

Witnesses at the time of the death told Gothamist and other local media that the officer, Darren Ilardi, didn’t turn on his flashing lights until after hitting Oyamada. After the accident, which took place in the early morning hours near a public housing complex in Queens, witnesses gathered around and responded angrily. They were quickly dispersed and never interviewed for the police report, according to Gothamist. Now, Oyamada’s family lawyer has obtained through Freedom of Information requests a video of the accident recorded by the public housing complex’s security cameras. The video is an edited compilation of footage from two cameras. Gothamist reports:

At the 1:35 mark, the headlights of an NYPD cruiser allegedly driven by Officer Ilardi appear in the upper left-hand corner of Camera 1. It speeds out of the right side of the frame at 1:42, after crossing the intersection of 40th Avenue and 10th Street. (This next block is where Oyamada was killed.) Pausing the video at several points appears to show that the cruiser’s flashing lights were not on, which is consistent with witness statements to the media and contrary to informal NYPD statements, as well as the police report.

At the 1:45 mark, Camera 1 appears to show the first indication that the NYPD cruiser’s flashing lights are on, judging by the reflection of lights on a street sign. This sudden reflection of lights would correspond to witness statements that Officer Ilardi only turned on his flashing lights after colliding with Oyamada.

The Oyamada family’s lawyer told Gothamist he believes the tape has been edited to remove the moment of the accident; the version that is in NYPD’s possession has not been made public. Further, the family charges in its recently filed lawsuit that records reveal Officer Ilardi was not even assigned to the 911 call to which NYPD claims he was responding. 

The case raises still more questions about a culture of lawlessness among police in New York City. In July, Eric Garner, an unarmed black man in Staten Island, was killed when police put him in a chokehold while detaining him for selling untaxed cigarettes. And earlier this month, U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara released a 79-page report documenting a “culture of violence” among corrections officers who have abused teenage inmates at the city’s jail on Rikers Island. The report found that more than 4 in 10 male teens in the jail had been subjected to use of force by guards as of October 2012, and that there was a “powerful code of silence” among the jail’s staff that prevented officials from being held accountable for abuse. 

White CHIPS Cop Who Beat Black Woman on side of road may Face Criminal Charges

ColorLines

California Highway Patrol officer Daniel Andrew, caught on video by a passing motorist straddling and repeatedly punching Marlene Pinnock on a Los Angeles freeway, may face criminal charges, Los Angeles’s ABC7 reported.

CHP sent its investigation on the incident to the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office, which now will decide whether to file charges against Andrew, ABC reported. CHP is also conducting its own internal investigation into the incident.

Last month, Pinnock and her attorneys filed a lawsuit alleging that her civil rights were violated. 

Tweeps Demand GoFundMe Remove Darren Wilson Support Page

From [HERE] In just five days, more than 5,000 people have donated more than $200,000 to GoFundMe's Support Officer Darren Wilson page. Wilson is the officer who shot and killed 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson nearly two weeks ago. 

Someone with the username "Stand Up" started the fundraiser on Sunday and says "proceeds will be sent directly to Darren Wilson and his family for any financial needs they may have including legal fees." The effort has been wildly successful, and the campaign keeps hiking up its goal--it's up to $250,000 now.

As a crowdfunding platform, GoFundMe collects five percent of each donation--meaning that at the time of publication, GoFundMe stands to profit $10,924.10, and that number is expected to rise.

Aside from the moral issue attached to profiting off of Michael Brown's death, critics are pointing out that fundraising supporters have made blatantly racist comments on the site--both are potentially violations of GoFundMe's own terms, which prohibit "items that promote hate, violence, racial intolerance, or the financial exploitation of a crime." Wilson's not been charged with a crime, but if he is, it's unclear whether raising funds for his legal fees is allowed on the platform. And Wilson supporters on the site have made overtly racist comments, which Twitter users have made clear in their call for GoFundMe to remove the campaign immediately--threatening a boycott if the fundraiser isn't pulled down.

One supporter refers to Wilson as an "animal control officer," who killed a "criminal thug":

Hey @gofundme , does this constitute hate speech, or do you guys still have wads of cash in your ears? pic.twitter.com/iwfmi6nBS5

-- Chris Sweet (@EffingDecaf) August 22, 2014

Wilson supporters weigh in on a "failed experiment in diversity" and a lot more:

did you see the @gofundme where awful people are literally rewarding darren wilson with cash for killing a black guy pic.twitter.com/KLGvLPRaxZ

-- jon hendren (@fart) August 21, 2014

At least one Wilson supporter impersonates Michael Brown:

OMG!!! Go Fund Me Campaign For Officer Darren Wilson Who Shot Mike Brown Has Raised $200,000 http://t.co/6RNl8XGitJ pic.twitter.com/FVcmicqKXn

-- Ask Kissy (@AskKissy) August 22, 2014

One supporter calls himself Jim Crow:

Hate & money keep coming in for the Darren Wilson @gofundme campaign. You have 16 hours to delete it or we boycott. pic.twitter.com/55XPtJBp7t

-- Shaun King (@ShaunKing) August 22, 2014

In response, GoFundMe has removed all comments--but not the fundraiser itself:

In regard to the 'Officer Darren Wilson' campaign, donors' comments posted in violation of GoFundMe's terms have been removed.

-- GoFundMe (@gofundme) August 22, 2014

The Wilson support campaign is set to wrap up in four days.

Do Not Expect Justice, Expect White Supremacy: Darren Wilson's Grand Jury is 75% White

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch has learned that the grand jury empanelled to decide whether evidence presented in Michael Brown's shooting warrants criminal charges against Ferguson officer Darren Wilson is 75 percent white: 

The grand jury that is hearing evidence in the Michael Brown shooting death has one black man and two black women on the panel, and six white men and three white women.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch adds that the judge in the case will consider whether to release more information about the grand jury, such as age and zip code, on Monday.

Refugees Fight Obama's Policies at Remote Immigration Prison

CourtHouse News

Ten mothers and children sued the United States on constitutional grounds Friday, claiming their imprisonment in the government's new immigration center in Artesia, N.M., 200 miles from the nearest large city, denies them due process, intentionally denies them access to legal counsel, and that the Obama administration's "detain and deport" policy violates the Convention Against Torture.     Major immigration law offices across the country signed the 60-page federal lawsuit, representing Honduran and Salvadoran mothers and children who are imprisoned at Artesia.     Attorneys for the refuge-seekers claim that the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Justice, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement deliberately chose the remote site to imprison immigrant mothers and children to deny them access to counsel, in violation of the Immigration and Nationality Act, the Convention Against Torture, the Administrative Procedure Act, and the Fifth Amendment.     The Obama administration opened up the remote prison in response to a perceived influx of immigrant children, particularly at the Texas-Mexico border.     Border Patrol statistics show that undocumented immigration actually is at a 40-year low; the only increase this year has been in the percentage of immigrants who are children, and/or from Honduras.     Lack of prisons to hold children, and political protests against immigrants, led the Obama administration to open the Artesia center to hold children and mothers, and speed up adjudications on their requests for refugee status.     Attorneys for the American Immigration Council, one of the law offices representing the mothers and children, said in a statement Friday that the Obama administration is systematically violating laws by policies that have:     "Categorically prejudged asylum cases with a 'detain-and-deport' policy, regardless of individual circumstances.     "Drastically restricted communication with the outside world for the women and children held at the remote detention center, including communication with attorneys. If women got to make phone calls at all, they were cut off after three minutes when consulting with their attorneys. This makes it impossible to prepare for a hearing or get legal help.     "Given virtually no notice to detainees of critically important interviews used to determine the outcome of asylum requests. Mothers have no time to prepare, are rushed through their interviews, are cut off by officials throughout the process, and are forced to answer traumatic questions, including detailing instances of rape, while their children are listening.     "Led to the intimidation and coercion of the women and children by immigration officers, including being screamed at for wanting to see a lawyer."     American Immigration Council attorney Melissa Crow called it "an assault on due process."     The 10 plaintiffs in the lawsuit, some of them widows, describe death threats from violent drug gangs who control neighborhoods in Honduras and El Salvador, whose notoriously corrupt police agencies allegedly told the mothers they could do nothing to protect them.     The lawsuit states: "This is an immigration case involving life and death stakes.     "Plaintiffs are mothers and children from El Salvador and Honduras who, like many other Central Americans, have fled persecution in their countries of origin.     "The United States government arrested plaintiff mothers and children shortly after they crossed into the United States near the Rio Grande Valley in Texas, and brought them to a makeshift detention facility in Artesia, New Mexico. The detention facility is profoundly isolated, miles away from any major cities and lawyers. The closest major metropolitan area is El Paso, Texas, which is close to 200 miles away.     "Under the Immigration and Nationality Act ('INA') and its implementing regulations- as well as under the Due Process Clause - plaintiffs have an indisputable right to seek asylum and related relief, and to a fair hearing to present their claims. But that process at Artesia has been anything but fair, and falls far short of the government's obligations under existing law. Instead, the government has created what can only be described as a 'deportation mill' that is sending mothers and children back to their home countries to face serious harm without ever having given them a meaningful opportunity to present their claims."