Welcome to Sott.net
Wed, 27 Oct 2021
The World for People who Think

Society's Child
Map

Pistol

2 cops shot at Ferguson protest rally near police station


RT
Thu, 12 Mar 2015 17:19 UTC
Image
© Kate Munsch / Reuters
Two police officers have been shot during a protest outside Ferguson Police Station, according to the St. Louis County Police chief, who said the men are conscious, but their injuries are "very serious."

A 32-year-old officer from Webster Groves was shot in the face and a 41-year-old from St. Louis County was shot in the shoulder, Chief Jon Belmar told journalists at a press conference. He added that both the injured were being treated at a local hospital.

"These police officers were standing there and they were shot, just because they were police officers," Belmar said.


The shooting broke out as the rally outside the police station was subsiding early on Thursday.
Police take cover after two cops were shot in front of Ferguson PD on Thursday, March 12, 2015. Pic- @LaurieSkrivan pic.twitter.com/1rTei6bZcn

— Lynden Steele (@manofsteele) March 12, 2015
A Reuters photographer at the scene said a few dozen demonstrators fled following the sound of gunfire with some screaming, "They hit a cop."

The St Louis County Police chief said at least three shots were fired during the rally. No suspects have yet been identified, he added.

A video has emerged featuring the moment the shots were fired. While it's low-resolution and not much can be seen, the sounds of gunfire are distinctly heard, as well as the groaning of a man who was hit.

      Read More...
Books

French Minister of Culture: France needs to drop resistance to outside languages, including English


RT
Thu, 12 Mar 2015 13:20 UTC
Image
© Reuters/Stephanie Mahe
French Culture Minister Fleur Pellerin
French Minister of Culture Fleur Pellerin says she doesn't believe that the French language should be saved from outside influences - including English.

Pellerin told the Local that France should take into account "the world it is in" and that French is "enriched by outside influences."

"We need a dynamic approach towards the language. Of course I want to defend the French language, but not to the point of preventing any influence from outside," she noted.

"We need to be able to understand the world we are in and that our language is enriched by external influences. French has always been a language that has been enriched by words from other languages," Pellerin, who is a fluent English and German speaker, added, according to the Local.

The minister said she isn't a "fanatic" like the Academie Francaise - a paragon for those who think French is under threat - despite the younger generation and businesspeople using a lot of English words in their everyday discourse.

"English has always fascinated me because it's easy to create new words or join two words and make a new word,"she said, adding that her favorite English word is "serendipity" (a pleasant surprise, or the ability to make unexpected pleasant discoveries).

"I want French to be a living language. Today we have around 250 million French speakers and in 30 years there will be around 700 million speakers of French, mainly in central and northern Africa," Pellerin said, the Local reported.

Comment: See also:

      Read More...
Camcorder

When cameras outnumber cops: Charges dropped against teen for 'assaulting' NYPD after video proved he was victim


RT
Thu, 12 Mar 2015 01:49 UTC
Image
© Screenshot from youtube video by El Grito
Prosecutors dropped charges against a 17-year-old for assaulting a police officer because footage of the incident between the teenager and New York Police Department cops proved the young man was actually the assault victim.

The incident took place at Brooklyn's Puerto Rican Day Parade in June. The 17-year-old, Enrique Del Rosario, was part of a group that was recording the actions of police. Officers then grabbed the teen, slamming him against a wall and beating him, according to his lawyer, Rebecca Heinegg.

Dennis Flores, head of police watchdog El Grito de Sunset Park ‒ an advocacy group that brings attention to what Flores describes as the controversial tactics of the NYPD ‒ was one of the people who filmed the assault on Rosario.

"We witnessed Enrique filming the police throwing a woman onto a sidewalk," Flores told RT. "And for that, a police officer bashed his head in, robbed him of his camera ‒ and I say robbed him because the camera never showed up as evidence; it completely disappeared, but something that we had on video ‒ clearly, cops grabbed him, slammed him against the gate."

"A second officer, named Elvis Marizalde, swung a nightstick, missed ‒ he cracked the head of another officer with his nightstick, and then charged [Rosario] for assaulting the police," Flores continued.

"And because of that, since we formed a chain of cameras around Enrique to film this, we started getting maced, we got attacked and we were pushed back. But because there were so many of us and so many cameras watching over each other, we outnumbered those cops."


Comment: Kudos for El Grito for their solidarity and standing up to the barbaric NYPD. It's good to see someone standing against the police state and fighting for our dignity as human beings.

      Read More...
People 2

Cruel and Inhuman: US slammed by UN as only nation that sentences children to die in prison

Sarah Lazare
Common Dreams
Tue, 10 Mar 2015 00:00 UTC
child in prison
© childrenofprison.eu
Some children go to jail. Some children never leave.
Special Rapporteur Juan Méndez notes US policy violates international human rights law

A United Nations human rights expert strongly condemned the U.S. on Tuesday for being the "only State in the world that still sentences children to life imprisonment without the opportunity for parole," thereby imposing cruel, inhuman, and degrading punishment.

Mendez
© www.un.org
Standing up for children's rights, Special Rapporteur Juan Méndez
Juan Méndez, the Special Rapporteur on torture, made the comments in a report to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva—building from his previous censure of cruel incarceration practices in a nation that locks up more people than any other country in the world.

Méndez noted that the U.S. practice of imposing life sentences on children in cases of homicide violates international law on numerous fronts, including the Convention on the Rights of the Child. "Life sentences or sentences of an extreme length have a disproportionate impact on children and cause physical and psychological harm that amounts to cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment," he wrote.

Such prison sentences are widespread. Approximately 2,500 people in the U.S. are currently serving life sentences without parole for crimes allegedly committed as juveniles, the Sentencing Project finds (pdf).

Comment: When public services are run for profit, judges are paid to fill jails and they do so with child convicts. Fill the prison, build another and increase the profit. The US holds 25% of the world's prison population for 5% of the world's people. In 1990 jail population was 1M and 5 private prisons, by 2000 it grew to 2M and 100 private prisons. Corporate stockholders make money off prisoners' work and taxpayer dollars. Prisoners = workforce = profit. Between 1980 and 1994 profits went from $392M to $1.31B. In private prisons, inmates receive as little as 17 cents per hour or $20 per month. Factories are firing their workers and contracting with prisoner-workers. It's about the money. And because they can.

      Read More...
Hardhat

Not in our yard: Maryland business owners call for moratorium on fracking


Food and Water Watch
Wed, 11 Mar 2015 20:30 UTC
maryland fracking protest
Dozens of business owners and concerned residents of Western Maryland descended on the capital today to highlight strong and growing demand in their region for a statewide fracking moratorium. They presented a letter to legislative leaders signed by more than 100 Western Maryland business owners calling for the moratorium. The letter cites deep concern over the grave effects the highly industrial, polluting process of fracking could have on regional businesses, particularly those related to the booming tourism and leisure industries. Western Maryland residents also delivered to the legislature today some of the 20,000 petitions from state residents calling for the moratorium that were recently collected by advocacy groups.

Delegate David Fraser-Hidalgo and Senator Karen Montgomery are the two lead sponsors on the Protect Our Health and Communities Act (HB 449/SB 409), introduced in February, to enact a long-term moratorium on fracking in the state.

"I believe the impacts from fracking will take our Golden Goose and send it flying. Having seen the equipment intensive widespread heavy industry that fracking is I cannot see how it is compatible with vacationing in Deep Creek Lake or Garrett County. Tourism pays a lot of bills in Garrett County," said Steven Green, co-owner of High Mountain Sports and former president of the Garrett County Chamber of Commerce.

Comment: Fortunately more people are waking up to the fact that the revenues generated cannot make up for the dangers posed to the environment, and the health of those who live in proximity to the drilling sites. Studies have linked the practice to earthquakes, water contamination, skin and respiratory infections.

      Read More...
Shopping Bag

Cash for cops: How civil forfeiture laws are used to enrich police departments

Devon Douglas-Bowers
Occupy.com
Tue, 10 Mar 2015 00:00 UTC
cash for cops, civil forfeiture
Civil forfeiture is a major issue that's recently gotten into the news, notably due to Attorney General Eric Holder's change to the controversial police action of seizing people's property. Unfortunately, Holder's actions, while laudable, won't stop the massive damage that has already been done - and may very well continue the problem. Because although the media has finally begun to talk about the issue, we still haven't been presented with a full scope of civil forfeiture: what it is and what it means.

To understand forfeiture, one must go back to colonial America. The idea of civil forfeiture comes directly from the British; early forfeiture law "refers to the power of a court over an item of real or personal property." This could include land, in which the court would decide who owned a piece of land, or marriage, where the courts would have the authority to terminate a marriage.

Originally, in rem jurisdiction was "incorporated into American customs and admiralty laws governing the seizure of ships for crimes of piracy, treason and smuggling in the early days of the Republic, and during the American Civil War." It was later formalized in 1966 "in the Supplemental Rules for Certain Admiralty and Maritime Claims which apply to our civil forfeiture cases." So the United States has always had some type of civil forfeiture law.

The situation changed, however, when President Nixon announced the War on Drugs and began to use civil forfeiture as an instrument of law enforcement. Author Montgomery Sibley notes that, as part of the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, Congress strengthened civil forfeiture as a means of confiscating illegal substances and the means by which they are manufactured and distributed. In 1978, Congress amended the law to authorize the seizure and forfeiture of the proceeds of illegal drug transactions as well.

Comment: Federal civil forfeiture laws empower the government to seize private property from Americans without ever charging, let alone convicting, them of a crime. The government then pockets the proceeds while providing no prompt way to get a court to review the seizure. The police are taking opportunistic advantage of these laws for their own means. Since they are getting away with killing people and their pets with impunity, they feel entitled to do as they please.

      Read More...
Sheriff

Ferguson police chief resigns amid furor over DoJ report

Ron Allen and M. Alex Johnson
NBC News
Wed, 11 Mar 2015 22:05 UTC
Image

Ferguson Police Chief Thomas Jackson at a news conference in August shortly after the fatal shooting of Michael Brown.
Ferguson, Missouri, Police Chief Thomas Jackson resigned Wednesday, the city announced. He is the latest in a string of city officials ousted in the wake of a Justice Department report that found a culture of racism in the police department and city offices.

Jackson's resignation — which the city said was a "mutual decision" — is effective March 19.

Municipal Judge Ronald Brockmeyer resigned Monday and City Manager John Shaw resigned Tuesday after they were highlighted in the scathing report, which was commissioned after white police officer Darren Wilson, who has since resigned, shot and killed unarmed black 18-year-old Michael Brown in August. Wilson wasn't charged in the shooting.

Two police officers were suspended and later resigned, and the city's top court clerk was fired.

Jackson came under sustained national criticism for his defense of his officers and his department's handling of protests after Brown's death. Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon eventually stripped Ferguson police of oversight of security and put the State Patrol in charge.

St. Louis County Executive Steve Stenger told KSDK that he has been meeting with Ferguson Mayor James Knowles III and that county police are ready to step in to assist.
      Read More...
Wine n Glass

Turn your water into wine! Feds approve powdered alcohol


CBS News/AP
Wed, 11 Mar 2015 16:46 UTC
powdered alcohol
© techeblog
A controversial powdered alcohol product called Palcohol, intended to be mixed into drinks, has gained approval from a federal agency.

Palcohol first made news last spring when it briefly received the greenlight from the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau, before the bureau backtracked and said the label approvals had been given in error.

On Wednesday, bureau spokesman Tom Hogue told The Associated Press the issues were resolved and that four varieties of Palcohol were approved. But Hogue noted that states can also regulate alcohol sales in their borders.

The latest approval is a step forward for a small company whose product plans have already sparked controversy.

Several states have already moved to ban powdered alcohol, including lawmakers in Colorado who last month advanced legislation to temporarily halt its sale. Concerns have included abuse by minors and whether Palcohol's light weight would make it easy to sneak alcohol into public events.

Comment: Mr. Phillips is going to be a very rich man.

      Read More...
Heart - Black

Arkansas Republican Justin Harris sent adopted daughters to known rapist because they were "possessed by demons"

David Ferguson
Raw Story
Wed, 11 Mar 2015 20:13 UTC
Image
The story of Arkansas state Rep. Justin Harris (R) — whose family adopted a pair of girls then "re-homed" them to another household where one of the girls was raped — has taken a bizarre turn with allegations that the Harris family gave the girls up because they believed the children could communicate telepathically and were possessed by demons.

The Arkansas Times reported on Wednesday that sources close to the family dispute many of the assertions Harris and his wife Marsha made last Friday at a press conference at the Arkansas state capitol.

The Harrises said they were never made aware that the girls were violent or that they posed a risk to a household with other children. Rep. Harris claimed that the family received no aid from the Department of Human Services (DHS) and that when they attempted to make the agency aware of issues with the girls, they threatened to charge him with child abandonment.

A bevy of witnesses — including, the Times said, "two foster families who cared for the girls prior to the Harris adoption, the girls' biological mother, a former DHS employee familiar with the proceedings and a former babysitter at the Harrises' West Fork home" — dispute virtually every word of the Harrises' account of the adoption and subsequent "re-homing" and rape.

Babysitter Chelsey Goldsborough told the Times that when she cared for the children in the home, she was alarmed at how the family treated the girls, who initially arrived in the home with an older sister. The Times, for the sake of clarity, gave the girls false names.

Comment: See: Arkansas politician 'rehomes' 6-year old adopted daughter to household of sexual predator

      Read More...
Satellite

Record number of drone pilots are quitting due to PTSD, mental health issues, and civilian deaths


YouTube
Tue, 10 Mar 2015 20:04 UTC
Drone room
© imgarcade.com
Military pilots control a reaper drone.
New reports show that a record number of drone pilots and operators are leaving their positions, despite the Obama administration ramping up drone warfare abroad. RT's Anya Parampil examines the numbers and why people have been leaving their posts - including for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).


Comment: See also: Pilots are deserting Washington's remote-control war

      Read More...
Amazon Smile
Revolt! T-shirts