Society's ChildS


Sherlock

Russian prosecutors to investigate farmers' claims of land grabs by major agricultural holdings


RT
Wed, 24 Aug 2016 16:16 UTC
russia tractor rally
© Проект РЕАЛЬНОСТЬ / YouTubeParticipants of the 'tractor rally' protest at the start of their voyage in Krasnodar Region
Prosecutors in southern Russia's Krasnodar Region have launched an investigation into claims of illegal land grabs by major holdings. The claims were made by a group of farmers who have begun a tractor rally to Moscow to draw attention to their cause.

A statement posted on the Krasnodar Prosecutors' Office website says the head of the agency, Leonid Korzhenik - together with the head of the regional administration, Veniamin Kondratyev, and several senior law enforcement officials - held a meeting with a group of farmers who earlier this week announced they were starting a 'tractor rally' to Moscow.

The farmers are seeking to deliver their complaints personally to the country's top authorities, and said about 100 people in 17 tractors and several cars are taking part in the protest.

At the meeting, the farmers expressed their grievances over a number of major deals in the region in which large land plots ended up being given to major agricultural holdings, including several cases in which the property rights had been awarded by courts.
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Family

Child neglect: Children found in Brevard home with feet 'caked' in dog feces


News 6
Tue, 23 Aug 2016 15:31 UTC
Chihuahuas
A Central Florida woman has been charged after authorities say she kept her two children and 24 Chihuahuas in a home filled with dog feces, trash and bugs.

Officials said the Port St. John home had dried, caked feces and urine, roaches and trash inside it, describing that the environment was in "no way safe for the animals, let alone the children who also were in the residence."

Investigators said two children, who weren't enrolled in school, had dog feces "caked" to the bottom of their bare feet. The Department of Children and Families removed the children from the home.

Comment: Another sign that society is disintegrating.

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Handcuffs

University study shows how prison populations skyrocket despite record low crime

Claire Bernish
The Free Thought Project
Tue, 23 Aug 2016 15:29 UTC
US prison overcrowding
The justice system's aversion to repeat offenders — not a rise in actual crime — feeds the prison-industrial complex, a new study has essentially found, as a record number of people receiving prison sentences have prior convictions.

Ohio State University sociologist Ryan King examined 33 years of data from the Minnesota Sentencing Guidelines Commission — around 355,000 felony convictions — and found despite the sharp decline in the crime rate since the mid-1990s, judges are often faced with repeat-offenders, whom they tend to sentence more harshly.

"The issue is that the average offender who appears before a judge for sentencing today has a much more extensive criminal record than they did in the past," noted King, a professor of sociology at OSU.

"It is much harder for judges not to give prison sentences to repeat offenders, so we have more convicted people going to prison."
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TV

Media blames Trump for waning voter confidence in the rigged system

Nick Bernabe
The Anti Media
Mon, 22 Aug 2016 15:27 UTC
lying media
2016 is the year many, many Americans began to question whether or not our elections, and to a lesser extent, our democracy (insert "it's a constitutional republic, big difference!" here) are rigged. As I've argued many times in the past year, there is plenty of evidence suggesting these skeptical Americans are, indeed, onto something with their suspicions.

But the corporate media has come out in defense of America's "democracy" — and political elites are defending the system, too. In the wake of Trump's recent rhetoric regarding the "rigged" system, the ruling class of the United States is peddling the fiction that somehow Trump's irresponsible sensationalism is solely to blame for the newfound feelings of illegitimacy plaguing our elections.
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Stop

British Muslims ordered off plane after being accused of ISIL affiliation

Anealla Safdar
Al Jazzera
Wed, 24 Aug 2016 14:57 UTC
Maryam, Ali and Sakina Dharas
© Sakina Dharas/Al JazeeraFrom left: Maryam, Ali and Sakina Dharas felt 'embarrassed' after being interrogated in public.
Three British Muslim siblings were left traumatized after being escorted off a plane in London and interrogated on the tarmac as armed police kept watch, after fellow passengers accused them of being members of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) group.

Sakina Dharas, 24, her sister Maryam, 19, and their brother Ali, 21, were on board EasyJet flight EZY3249 from London's Stansted Airport to the Italian city of Naples on August 17.

Sakina told Al Jazeera on Tuesday that as the plane was about to take off, a crew member ordered the siblings off the aircraft and escorted them down the staircase to the tarmac, where they were met by armed police and an MI5 agent who questioned them for one hour.
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Red Flag

What the death of Gawker means for free speech and investigative journalism

Trevor Timm
Boing Boing
Tue, 23 Aug 2016 14:55 UTC
gawker death
© ROB BESCHIZZA
Gawker.com, the pioneering and controversial media blog, officially died yesterday. It was killed by billionaire Peter Thiel in his successful quest to bankrupt Gawker Media Group through a series of lawsuits he funded - most notably wrestler Hulk Hogan, who sued over the publication of a portion of his sex tape four years ago.

Out of all the controversial topics that we've tweeted about at Freedom of the Press Foundation - and there have been a lot - by far the most negative response we've received is from Gawker critics who are happy to see the website die.

The Hogan case certainly brings up a lot of tangled questions about the tension between privacy and free speech and it's certainly understandable that many people have found Gawker's decision to publish a clip of Hulk Hogan's sex tape deplorable. (It's also true that Gawker did a lot of exemplary investigative journalism). But condemning a specific story and cheering the demise of a media organization at the hands of the legal system are two very different things.
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MIB

UPDATE: 'Assange kill attempt'? Unknown man climbs Ecuador's London embassy


RT
Mon, 22 Aug 2016 14:48 UTC
Assange kill attempt
© Peter Nicholls / Reuters
Social media users are in a panic after WikiLeaks said an unknown man had climbed the Ecuadorian embassy in London where Julian Assange has been staying for four years. Users suggested that it was probably an assassination attempt, "ordered by Clinton."

"...At 2:47am an unknown man scaled the side wall [and the] window of the Ecuadorian embassy in London; fled after being caught by security," a statement from WikiLeaks said early Monday morning.

Comment: Hard to say what he was doing or who was behind it, but it wouldn't be a surprise if Killary was involved. Remember this? Clinton strategist & Politico senior staff writer calls for assassination of Julian Assange. There are some strange deaths surrounding her.


See also: Voting for Hillary? You may want to recall the Clinton body count

UPDATE:

Police took 2hrs to reach building where Assange is holed up
Ecuador has criticized British police for their slow response to a call reporting that an unknown man was trying to break into at its London embassy, where WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been living for four years.

The Ecuadorian government condemned the "inadequate response" of London police, who it claims arrived two hours after the incident took place. The delayed response is especially surprising given the huge quantity of resources Britain has poured into surveillance operations outside the embassy since 2012.

Quito released a press statement on Tuesday afternoon in which it confirmed reports that an unidentified man had tried to break into its London embassy in the early hours of Monday morning.





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Info

US Army pegs Clinton and Petraeus as 'insider threats' during OPSEC training


RT
Wed, 24 Aug 2016 14:43 UTC
US troops
© Mario Anzuoni / Reuters
The Army confirms a photo of Hillary Clinton was part of a lineup of "insider threats" for an Operations Security (OPSEC) training class. The lineup included whistleblowers Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning, as well as two mass murderers.

The photo of the Democratic presidential candidate appeared on an OPSEC training slide entitled: "Who is the Threat? Insiders."

"We have confirmed that the slide was developed 18 months ago and used locally as a part of a training presentation on best practices for handling classified material and maintaining operational security," Army Maj. Thomas Campbell, US Army Training and Doctrine Command spokesperson, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Comment: Well, at least the military gets one thing right.

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Sherlock

FBI launches terrorism investigation after knife attack

Mike Levine
ABC News
Tue, 23 Aug 2016 14:32 UTC
Wasil Farooqui
© Western Virginia Regional JailWasil Farooqui
The FBI has launched a federal terrorism investigation into a weekend stabbing in Roanoke, Virginia, looking at whether the attacker may have been trying to behead his victim in an alleged ISIS-inspired assault, sources told ABC News.

Federal authorities have been aware of the alleged attacker, 20-year-old Wasil Farooqui of the Roanoke area, for some time, sources familiar with the case told ABC News. In the past year, sources said, he traveled to Turkey and may have tried to sneak into Syria, where ISIS is recruiting and inspiring sympathizers from around the world.

Farooqui was arrested Saturday by Roanoke County Police on charges of assault with malicious wounding, and he is being held without bond at the Western Virginia Regional Jail, according to the sources and a jail database.

On Saturday, Farooqui allegedly injured a man and woman at an apartment complex in Roanoke, yelling "Allahu akbar" -- God is great -- as he attacked them with a knife, sources told ABC News.

Comment: Did Farooqui really intend to behead him? Police don't think so. So all we really have is a violent crime, 'Allahu Akbar', and the trip to Turkey. While certainly suggestive, more evidence is clearly need to establish any definite ties. What did he do in Turkey? Who did he meet? Does he have any FBI friends, perhaps?

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Handcuffs

Russian soldier sentenced to life for Armenian family massacre


RFE/RL
Wed, 24 Aug 2016 14:17 UTC
Avetisians' home
The hallway that Private Valery Permyakov allegedly entered on his way to carrying out the killings in the Avetisians' home. Five family members were shot; 6-month-old Seryozha and his mother, Araksia Pogosian (second and third from right), were stabbed with a bayonet.
An Armenian court has found a Russian soldier guilty of murder charges and sentenced him to life in prison for the 2015 massacre of seven members of an Armenian family.

The court in Armenia's northwestern city of Gyumri issued the verdict and sentence against Russian Army Private Valery Permyakov on August 23.

He was found guilty of all charges against him -- including the murder of seven people, a robbery attack, and an attempt to illegally cross the border.

The court did not specify where Permyakov would be imprisoned.
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