Society's ChildS


Stop

Fifty-four arrested in largest act of civil disobedience in Walmart history


Surrounded by about 100 police officers in riot gear and a helicopter circling above, more than 50 Walmart workers and supporters were arrested in downtown Los Angeles Thursday night as they sat in the street protesting what they called the retailer's "poverty wages."

Organizers said it was the largest single act of civil disobedience in Walmart's 50-year history. The 54 arrestees, with about 500 protesting Walmart workers, clergy and supporters, demonstrated outside LA's Chinatown Walmart. Those who refused police orders to clear the street after their permit expired were arrested without incident. Those who fail to post $5,000 bail would be jailed overnight, Detective Gus Villanueva, a Los Angeles Police Department spokesman, told The Huffington Post.

Their primary demand to Walmart: pay every full-time worker at least $25,000 a year.

One of the protesting Walmart workers, Anthony Goytia, a 31-year-old father of two, said he believes he will make about $12,000 this year. It's a daily struggle, he said, "to make sure my family doesn't go hungry."

"The power went out at my house yesterday because I couldn't afford the bill," Goytia told HuffPost. "I had to run around and get two payday loans to pay for my rent from the first" of the month. "Yesterday we went to a food bank."

To make ends meet, Goytia said he sometimes participates in clinical trials and sells his blood plasma. He has been asking his managers for full-time employment for a year and a half. Instead, he said, they hire temporary workers, who can be fired at any time.

Goytia was one of several dozen Walmart workers in Southern California who went on strike Wednesday and Thursday, calling for an end to low wages, unpredictable part-time hours and retaliation for speaking out. They were joined by other employees on their days off and dozens more who rode buses from Northern California.

Arrow Down

Corrupt prosecutor faces 10 days in jail after sending innocent man to prison for 25 years

Ken Anderson
© AP Photo/Statesman.com, Ricardo BrazziellKen Anderson
Williamson County, Texas - A corrupt former prosecutor will face a rare penalty for intentionally withholding evidence in a trial that sent an man to prison 25 years ago. For robbing an innocent man of decades of his life, the ex-D.A. will spend now have to spend 10 days in jail.

The case takes us back more than two decades. On the morning of August 13, 1986, the body of Christine Morton was found beaten to death with a wooden object in her bed. Her sheets were stained with blood and semen, and her credit card was missing. Her husband, Texas grocery store manager Michael Morton had not been home since 5:30 a.m., but was seized as the prime suspect. He had no arrests, convictions, or history of violence against anyone at that time. He was charged and put on trial for his wife's murder.

The prosecution, led by district attorney Ken Anderson, presented no physical evidence or witnesses that tied Michael Morton to the crime. They hypothesized that Morton had beaten his wife to death before going to work because she refused to have sex with him on his birthday. The prosecution claimed that Morton arranged the scene to look like a burglary, and that he masturbated on his wife's corpse.

These charges came while Anderson was sitting on evidence that could have redeemed Michael Morton. The Mortons' 3-year-old son, Eric, had been present during the murder. According to Eric, the murderer was not his daddy, but a "monster." Young Eric had described the crime scene and murder in great detail, and specifically told investigators that his "Daddy" was "not home" when it happened.

Additionally withheld was the fact that Mortons' neighbors told investigators that a man had repeatedly parked a green van on the street behind the crime scene and walked off into a nearby wooded area, days before the murder. Then there was the inconvenient fact (for the prosecution) that the victim's missing credit card had been used at a San Antonio jewelry store.

None of this evidence was released during the trial. On February 17, 1987, Michael Morton was convicted of murder and given a life sentence.

Handcuffs

Thieves charged with kidnapping, cutting off marijuana dispensary owner's penis

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© Orange County District Attorney's Office/AP PhotoThis image provided by the Orange County District Attorney's Office shows Kyle Handley, one of four people charged with kidnapping a California marijuana dispensary owner, torturing him with a blowtorch and cutting off his penis during a robbery because they thought he was burying piles of cash in the desert, authorities said on, Nov. 8, 2013.
Four people were charged with kidnapping a California marijuana dispensary owner, torturing him with a blowtorch and cutting off his penis during a robbery because they thought he was burying piles of cash in the desert, authorities said Friday.

Ryan Anthony Kevorkian, 34, and Naomi Josette Kevorkian, 33, were arrested Friday in Fresno, a day after the FBI arrested 34-year-old Hossein Nayeri in Prague in the Czech Republic, Orange County authorities said in a statement.

Nayeri was expected to face extradition proceedings.

Another man, Kyle Shirakawa Handley, 34, was arrested in October of last year.

The four have been charged with kidnapping for ransom, aggravated mayhem, torture, burglary and a sentencing enhancement for inflicting great bodily injury. They were being held without bail and could face up to life in prison without possibility of parole if convicted, prosecutors said.

It was not immediately known whether the Kevorkians and Nayeri had obtained lawyers.

Handley pleaded not guilty to the charges last month.

Cell Phone

Shop is evacuated and fire brigade are called after brand new iPad Air explodes and fills mobile phone store with smoke

  • Sparks and smoke flew from device released on November 1
  • Vodaphone store had to be evacuated following incident
  • Fire fighters put out the blaze started by demonstration model
A brand new iPad Air exploded in flames in an Australian mobile phone store.

The explosion and fire were so severe that the fire brigade had to be called in to fight the smoke and sparks that were continuing to burst out from the device.

The incident occurred in a Vodafone store in Canberra and the shop had to be evacuated.

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The burned iPad Air, which caused an Australian store to be evacuated when it burst into flames

USA

Psychiatrist said dad 'unfit' for refusing to take son to McDonald's

A defamation lawsuit in New York alleges a court-appointed psychiatrist told a judge a man who refused to take his son to McDonald's was an unfit parent.
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David Schorr, 43, a Manhattan attorney, filed a lawsuit in city Supreme Court alleging court-appointed psychiatrist Marilyn Schiller filed a report in his custody battle saying he was "wholly incapable of taking care of his son" and should be denied weekend visitation rights for refusing to take his 4-year-old son to the fast-food restaurant, the New York Post reported Friday.

Schorr said the incident in question involved his son throwing a temper tantrum during a Tuesday night visitation last week when he refused to take him to McDonald's.

Schorr said he told the boy they could go to any restaurant other than McDonald's, but if his son would not consent to another restaurant, there would be no dinner.

"The child, stubborn as a mule, chose the 'no dinner' option," Schorr said in the lawsuit. "It was just a standoff. I'm kicking myself mightily.

Books

Amazon sending independent bookshops a trojan horse?

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One bookshop owner said the scheme would be like "inviting hungry foxes into the henhouse"
Bookshop owners have hit back at an initiative by Amazon to sell its Kindle e-book reader in independent shops.

The Amazon Source programme, launching first in the US, would let bookshops sell the devices and receive a small cut of e-book sales thereafter.

But reaction has been hostile - one US bookseller described it as "inviting hungry foxes into the henhouse".

Amazon said bookshops "should be striving to offer customers what they want".

Announcing the initiative earlier this week the company said: "With Amazon Source, customers don't have to choose between e-books and their favourite neighbourhood bookstore - they can have both."

No Entry

French court orders Google to censor previously published images taken at disgraced ex-Formula 1 boss Max Mosley's five-hooker S&M orgy

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Max Mosley didn't seem to realise that reawakened interest in his case would boost rankings of said images!
Now everyone will view it AGAIN


Max, old bean - have you ever heard of the Streisand Effect?

A French judge has told Google to devise a way to take down all links to nine images of former F1 boss Max Mosley at a sadomasochistic orgy.

Mosley raised a case at the Paris superior court after claiming Google had not done enough to remove links to nine images of him cavorting with prostitutes - even though he successfully sued the News of the World, which published a video of the orgy, for breaching his privacy.

At a 2008 court hearing in Britain the F1 supremo confessed he had taken part in a sado-masochistic sex party.

Mr Justice Eady ruled the NoTW's allegations that the naughty knees-up had a Nazi theme were false. The judge admitted the orgy involved "bondage, beating and domination" and was "unconventional", but ordered the red-top to pay Mosley £60,000 nonetheless.

Now Google has been told to pay Mosley a token €1 (£0.89) in damages and €5,000 in costs, prompting the advertising giant to protest against the order to build a "censorship machine".

Comment: The plaintiff is obviously shooting himself in the foot, but note that this first for internet censorship comes to us courtesy of France, a country with an extraordinary fear of the Internet.


Health

Dengue cases reach 5,757 in Philippines' Davao City; floods, poor sanitation blamed

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© Unknown
Davao City - Floods and dirty surroundings were among the causes for the surge in dengue cases here during the first 10 months of the year, a Department of Health official in Southern Mindanao said Monday.Mary Divine Hilario, chief of the DOH's health education and information division, said the number of cases in this city was staggering.

Out of the 9,593 dengue cases posted region-wide as of October 30, Davao City accounted for 5,757 cases, Hilario said. Compostela Valley registered 971 dengue cases; Davao del Norte, 731; Davao Oriental, 1,113; and Davao del Sur, 1,004, she added. Thirty of the 60 deaths in Southern Mindanao were also from this city."These are mainly from the Buhangin District," Hilario said.

Cult

Businessman arrested in Australian yeshiva child sex abuse case

Daniel
Daniel "Gug" Hayman
Police in Sydney, Australia have arrested and charged a 49-year-old businessman, Daniel "Gug" Hayman, with charges related to child sexual abuse allegedly carried out at a camp affiliated with Chabad's Yeshiva Centre in Bondi.

Police in Sydney, Australia have arrested and charged a 49-year-old businessman, Daniel "Gug" Hayman, with charges related to child sexual abuse allegedly carried out at a camp affiliated with Chabad's Yeshiva Centre in Bondi, The Age reported.

The alleged abuse took place in 1985 and 1986. The two alleged male victims were 14- and 16-years-old at the time of the alleged abuse, which allegedly took place while Hayman was working as a senior counselor at a Chabad camp run by the Yeshiva Centre.

Hayman, who was approximately 21- to 22-years old at the time the alleged abuse took place, was charged with two counts of gross indecency and was refused bail.

The Age reports that Hayman's arrest and charging is "likely to put some of Australia's most senior rabbinical figures under scrutiny over their failures to act on complaints from victims. Despite complaints, Hayman was never reported to police and left Australia to live in Los Angles Jewish community, where leaders again acted to shield him."

Hayman was reportedly a director of a major Jewish educational organization in Australia "for several years after his alleged sexual abuse of boys" was reported to Chabad Yeshiva officials.

Heart - Black

First do no harm? UK nursing home staff tried for abuse of residents

Hillcroft nursing home
There are five privately-owned Hillcroft nursing homes in north Lancashire
Three carers mocked, bullied and assaulted elderly residents of a care home, a court has heard.

The three female staff members deny abusing eight people with advanced dementia at Hillcroft nursing home in Slyne-with-Hest near Lancaster.

One resident was slapped and others were mocked "for entertainment" between May 2010 and September 2011, Preston Crown Court was told.

A fourth carer has pleaded guilty to ill-treating residents, the jury heard.

Darren Smith, 34, of Howgill Avenue, Lancaster, was seen in bed with a distressed resident and has admitted abusing eight people at the home, the court heard.