Society's ChildS

Pistol

Seven people shot in Indianapolis

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Police investigating a shooting in Broad Ripple, Indianapolis, that left seven people injured.
Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department is investigating an early morning shooting that injured several people.

Indianapolis Metro Police confirm seven people shot in Broad Ripple early Saturday morning.

Briefcase

UK pension funds initiate first-ever US lawsuit against BP over Deepwater Horizon losses

Major UK shareholders in BP have joined together to sue the British energy giant in the US over lost earnings from the infamous Deepwater Horizon oil rig blast in 2010. The case is the first in the US, where awards are much bigger than in the UK.
deepwater oil slick
© Agence France-Presse / Mark RalstonA National Guard Blackhawk helicopter flies over the oil slick as it passes through the protective barrier formed by the Chandeleur Islands, as cleanup operations continue for the BP Deepwater Horizon platform disaster off Louisiana, on May 7, 2010.
The new litigation is led by Pomerantz Law, which has brought together 32 major BP shareholders from various countries, though mostly from Great Britain, who acquired their shares before the 2010 accident in the Gulf of Mexico and sustained financial losses as a result of the collapse in the value of shares that followed the disaster.

The Deepwater Horizon blowout caused the value of London-based BP shares to immediately plunge by over a half, and even today the shares have not recovered to their restored to their 2010 level.

"The fact that UK pension funds who bought stock on the London Stock Exchange can now participate in bringing claims in the US raises the prospect of recoveries where significant losses have been incurred," Pomerantz lawyer Jennifer Pafiti told the London Evening Standard.

So far only those investors who bought their BP shares on the US market, for example at the New York Stock Exchange, were allowed to file lawsuits in US courts. A number of rulings in Texas courts now appear to have opened the way for British investors to have their cases heard in the US under English law, however.
Deepwater Horizon ablaze
© USCGThe BP/Transocean Deepwater Horizon oil rig ablaze.
American judges generally impose much higher fines than their British counterparts, so Pomerantz's lawsuit could potentially cost BP billions of dollars.

"All of the plaintiffs' securities claims relating to the Deepwater Horizon accident are meritless and we will continue to vigorously dispute them," a BP spokesman in London said Friday night, as quoted by The Guardian.

Among the new litigants preparing lawsuits against BP are over a dozen British and European pension funds, including a pension fund of BP's principal rival, Royal Dutch Shell.

Music

Germany: Motorhead fan suffers brain bleed from headbanging

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© Thetimes.co.uk
It may not destroy your soul, but it turns out heavy metal music can be hazardous to your brain. At least in some rare cases.

German doctors say they have treated a Motorhead fan whose headbanging habit ultimately led to a brain injury, but that the risk to metal fans in general is so small they don't need to give up the shaking.

Last January, doctors at Hannover Medical School saw a 50-year-old man who complained of constant, worsening headaches. The patient, who was not identified, had no history of head injuries or substance abuse problems but said he had been headbanging regularly for years - most recently at a Motorhead concert he attended with his son.

After a scan, doctors discovered their patient had a brain bleed and needed a hole drilled into his brain to drain the blood. The patient's headaches soon disappeared. In a follow-up scan, the doctors saw he had a benign cyst which might have made the metal aficionado more vulnerable to a brain injury.

Sheriff

Not submitting to a police beating is 'attempted murder' in Florida

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© Newyorkdailynews
Every day, somewhere in this supposedly free county, some version of this script is played out: A police officer spies an individual committing a harmless but "illegal" act, aggressively pursues the subject, inflicts physical violence on the victim, then escalates that violence to lethal or nearly lethal levels when the victim doesn't immediately submit to the state-licensed aggression.

We could refer to this as the "From Malum Prohibitum to Murder" model of police escalation. Citizens who aren't killed in such encounters can expect to be punished for the impudence they display by surviving. Police officers responsible for the actual crimes of violence will not face prosecution, owing to the evil doctrine of "qualified immunity." A recent episode in Florida resulted in several charges - including attempted murder - against a man whose only apparent "offense" was to refuse to submit to a beating by a police officer.

The assault began when an officer named Ronald Cannella who had attempted to pull over a man named Livingston Manners for allegedly running a stop light dragged the driver from his vehicle and threw him to the ground in a gas station. It's quite likely that Manners, in justifiable fear for his safety, sought a well-lit area for the encounter with the brigand.

Comment: Listen to SOTT Talk Radio's most recent discussion on this very issue.

See also:
  • The dangerous militarization of our local police forces
  • Cops Kill More Americans than have been killed in Iraqโ€



Target

DUH! Analyst says terror threats blowback from 'wrong-headed' US policies

tsa
Americans are tired of "constant terrorist warnings" issued by the US government, which are the direct result of Washington's "wrong-headed" foreign policy, a political analyst says.

US intelligence officials say they are concerned al-Qaeda is trying to develop a new and sophisticated bomb that could go undetected through airport security.

On Wednesday, the Department of Homeland Security ordered the enhancement of security measures at selected overseas airports with nonstop flights to the US.

"The warnings are coming right on the eve of the 4th of July holiday, this patriotic holiday in the United States," said Daniel Patrick Welch in a phone interview with Press TV.

"The American people are exhausted from this constant terrorist warnings and the warning of the next great 9/11," he added.

The news just shows "how disastrous and wrong-headed the US policy has become or has always been actually," Welch said.

"In erecting this massive security state," he pointed out, "the only thing they have managed to foil so far are the plots that they themselves have concocted."

"They have caught people that they have enticed into a trap and caught them before they acted."

The analyst said that the security threats represent a foreign policy blowback resulting from US wars and interventions.

"If you keep funding the same organizations in Iraq and Syria and all over the world eventually the genie is going to come back and bite you."

"It [warning] could be a false flag or it could the obvious result of wrong-headed policy. It really doesn't make much of a difference to people flying," Welch said.

The authorities seek to keep the population "scared and subservient to the people in power," he concluded.

Books

Asia's culture of intelligence

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© Flickr/RageZ
I have been traveling to East Asia (and many other parts of the world) for more than 25 years and over that time one of the things that has always struck me is how intelligent the general public in countries like Japan appear to be. It's not that there aren't dummies in East Asia, but it always seems that the average level of education and ability to think about the world intelligently and critically is impressively widespread. I've often thought about why this is the case and also why the same seems more difficult to say about the U.S. The answer, I think, can be found in a comment science fiction writer Isaac Asimov made about the U.S. while being interviewed in the 1980s: "There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."

Star of David

Dealing with Israeli settlements is a bad idea - 12 more EU states warn businesses against it

illegal israeli settlements
© Reuters/Ronen Zvulun
An Israeli flag waves on a hill near the West Bank Jewish settlement of Elazar, in the Etzion settlement bloc near Bethlehem
Amid growing Palestine-Israeli tensions, 12 more EU states have joined European heavyweights - such as the UK, Germany and France - in urging their nationals to refrain from doing business in Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

The group of those who issued warnings for their citizens on includes: Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, Portugal, Slovakia, and Slovenia.

The European nations stated that Israeli settlements in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, Gaza and the Golan Heights are illegal and hamper a peaceful settlement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Involvement in business activities in the area carries both financial and reputational risks for investors, they warned.

The European states also pointed out that the EU "will not recognize any changes to the pre-1967 borders, including with regard to Jerusalem, other than those agreed by the parties".

Comment: It will take a lot more than warnings to make a dent in Israel's ongoing land grabs and indiscriminate murder. It should be isolated from the world as the pariah it is.
  • It needs to be said over and over again: Israel does not want peace
  • Israel halts peace talks so it can continue to torture and murder Palestinians
  • Unattainable peace: Illegal West Bank settlements expansion continues
  • An endless "Peace Process" for Palestine



Ambulance

Kidnapped and murdered Palestinian teen was burned alive -- autopsy

Palestinian funeral
© Reuters / Ammar AwadPalestinian women hold flags as they chant slogans during the funeral of 16-year-old Mohammed Abu Khudair in Shuafat, an Arab suburb of Jerusalem, July 4, 2014.
Soot found in the lungs of an East Jerusalem youth, whose funeral drew thousands on Friday, means the teenager was still alive and breathing when he was burned, according to the preliminary results of an autopsy.

The autopsy, carried out by Israeli doctors in Tel Aviv and attended by a Palestinian forensic expert, revealed that over 90 percent of the boy's skin was burned and he suffered a head injury.

"The direct cause of death was burns as a result of fire and its complications," Palestinian Attorney-General Mohammed Al-A'wewy was quoted as saying by the official Palestinian news agency, Wafa.

Fire dust material was found in the boy's respiratory system, which means "the boy had inhaled this material while he was burnt alive." The final report on the autopsy will be issued following more lab examinations of the body's tissue samples.

Muhammad Abu Khdeir, 16, was kidnapped Wednesday in his neighborhood in Arab East Jerusalem. His charred body was found several hours later in a forest on the outskirts of the city.

Comment: The Israelis routinely call Palestinians animals, yet the Israelis are more often than not the ones behaving like monsters.


Star of David

More police brutality: Israeli cops caught beating 15 year old U.S. cousin of murdered Palestinian teen

Tarek Abu Khdeir
© AFP Photo / Ahmad GharabliThe mother of Tarek Abu Khdeir (portrait), the 15-year-old cousin of the murdered Palestinian youth Mohammad, shows a picture of her son, she took of him at the hospital after he was assaulted by Israeli police in East Jerusalem on July 5, 2014.

A shocking video, showing Israeli police officers savagely beating 15-year-old Palestinian-American Tarek Abu Khdeir - cousin of Mohammad Abu Khdeir who was burnt alive in East Jerusalem - has prompted outrage in the Palestinian community.

The video shows two officers striking the detainee, who was handcuffed and lying on the floor. One of the officers seems to be sitting on the Palestinian, while his colleague is kicking and punching him. The youth is eventually dragged away by the police.

The video of Tarek's beating has surfaced as the funeral was held Friday for his cousin, Mohammad Abu Khdeir, who was kidnapped in the same area and burned alive.

The beating, shot from two different angles by people filming from their windows, took place on Thursday evening in Shuafat, a neighborhood in East Jerusalem.

One of the videos was broadcast on the Palestine Today television channel.

The second video posted on Facebook by Quds News Network shows the same incident.

Tariq has since been arrested and held without charge, according to his family and the rights group Addameer, as reports the Ma'an News Agency.

According to a police spokesman, the incident featured in the video occurred while six "masked rioters" were being arrested. Three of them were alleged to have been carrying knives.


Comment: Palestinians experience this type of treatment daily. Just this fact alone should be enough to understand the general sentiment of Palestinians in the occupied territories and living in Israel.


Handcuffs

A history of violence: LA cops beating women 'just the norm'

david diaz
An American activist says a recent incident where a California Highway Patrol cop unleashed a barrage of punches to the face of a black woman is "just the norm" and another episode in the long history of police brutality in the US.

A recently published video captured by a driver shows a white CHP officer chasing a black woman who was walking on the eastbound 10 Freeway near the La Brea onramp, tackling her on the ground, and beginning to punch her repeatedly in the face.

"It's just another episode in the fabulous LAPD [Los Angeles Police Department] history of violence and what we call the 'blue line' where the police departments protect those that are even criminals within their own organization," said Tighe Barry, an activist with CODEPINK, a peace and social justice movement dedicated to ending US-funded wars and occupations.

"They show no respect for a woman, they will beat a woman, they will kill men and sometimes kill women," he added.


Comment: See also: 'She was screaming': Psychopathic Calif. Highway Patrol officer caught on video pummeling woman