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Organized "bash mob" crime rampages of roving groups attacking innocent people and businesses have been striking cities around the United States. Law enforcement agencies in Southern California have reported few similar problems -- until now.
In the last several days, there have been several reports of such group crime waves in South L.A., Hollywood, San Bernardino and Victorville. Long Beach police are bracing for another one Friday.
These so-called bash mobs of "flash mob" crime waves are organized through social media and have been a problem in Chicago, Philadelphia and Washington. In April, 28 Chicago youths were arrested on suspicion of attacking pedestrians along the city's famed Magnificent Mile. Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn signed legislation in May enacting stiffer penalties for people who text or use social media to organize mob attacks.
© Agence France Presse/Kevork DjansezianGold coins are on display for sale
Judge Legrome Davis of the Eastern District Court of Pennsylvania affirmed a 2011 jury decision that a box of 1933 Saint-Gaudens double eagle coins discovered by the family of Israel Switt, a deceased dealer and collector, is the property of the United States.
In the midst of the Great Depression, then-President Franklin Roosevelt ordered that America's supply of double eagles manufactured at the Philadelphia Mint be destroyed and melted into gold bars. Of the 445,500 or so coins created, though, some managed to escape the kiln and ended up into the hands of collectors. In 2003, Switt's family opened a safe deposit back that their grandfather kept, revealing 10 coins among that turned out to be among the world's most valuable collectables in the currency realm today.
Her boyfriend came over, and after dinner - about 8 p.m. - Goldsberry went to her kitchen sink to wash some dishes.
That's when her boyfriend, Craig Dorris - a manager for a security alarm company - heard her scream and saw her drop to the floor.
Goldsberry, 59, said she had looked up from the sink to see a man "wearing a hunting vest."
He was aiming a gun at her face, with a red light pinpointing her.
"I screamed and screamed," she said.
But she also scrambled across the floor to her bedroom and grabbed her gun, a five-shot .38-caliber revolver. Goldsberry has a concealed weapons permit and says the gun has made her feel safer living alone. But she felt anything but safe when she heard a man yelling to open the door.
He was claiming to be a police officer, but the man she had seen looked to her more like an armed thug. Her boyfriend, Dorris, was calmer, and yelled back that he wanted to see some ID.
But the man just demanded they open the door. The actual words, the couple say, were, "We're the f------ police; open the f------ door."
Dorris said he moved away from the door, afraid bullets were about to rip through.
Goldsberry was terrified but thinking it just might really be the police. Except, she says she wondered, would police talk that way? She had never been arrested or even come close. She couldn't imagine why police would be there or want to come in. But even if they did, why would they act like that at her apartment? It didn't seem right.
Two of the ten men have been charged for the horrific attacks, which happened on June 29 in Austin, Texas. The two captured suspects are 25-year-old Juan Lozano Ortega and 26-year-old Edgar Gerardo Guzman Perez.
The girl had run away from home prior to the attacks, and was staying in a group home for children. It was there that she met three unknown men and got into a car with them. Those three men have not yet been caught by officials.
The affidavit for the case said, "All of the other males took turns having sex with victim against her will, which lasted through the early morning hours."
Why exactly shouldn't banks be able to trade physical commodities? To see one argument, take a look at a big report from David Kocieniewski in today's New York Times.
According to Kocieniewski, a Goldman Sachs-owned company has been involved in an elaborate plan to move around aluminum in a way that has inflated market prices. The report states that every time an American consumer buys a product containing aluminum, they pay a price that has been affected by this maneuver. Sources told The New York Times that in total the plan has cost American consumers more than $5 billion over the last three years.
© Getty Images
The woman who first noticed the bloodsucking creepy crawlers yelped to others in the courtroom and chaos ensued; several people ran out of the proceedings, including the man with the bugs on him, the Daily News reported.
A Manhattan Criminal Court spokesman confirmed to the News that there was bug-related havoc in one of the arraignment rooms around 11:30 a.m., but said that no evidence of bedbugs was found in the area.
Court officers called in an exterminator as a precaution. The courtroom was evacuated for a time during the extermination treatment, and when it reopened, the three rows near where the alleged bug man had been sitting were roped off.
© David Woo/MCTThe seal of the Department of Justice which includes the FBI.
Washington - The FBI will review thousands of old cases, including some involving the death penalty, in which hair samples helped secure convictions, under an ambitious plan made public Thursday.
More than 2,000 cases the FBI processed from 1985 to 2000 will be re-examined, including some in which execution dates have been set and others in which the defendants already have died in prison. In a key concession, Justice Department officials will waive usual deadlines and procedural hurdles that often block inmates from challenging their convictions.
"This will be critical to giving wrongly convicted people a fair chance at a fair review," said Steven D. Benjamin, a Virginia attorney who's the president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.
The defense lawyers' association joined with The Innocence Project, based at New York City's Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University, as well as pro bono attorneys to press for the review.
The study will focus on whether analysts exaggerated the significance of their hair analyses or reported them inaccurately. Defendants will be notified and free DNA testing offered if errors in lab work or testimony are detected.
"The government's willingness to admit error and accept its duty to correct those errors in an extraordinarily large number of cases is truly unprecedented," declared Peter Neufeld, a co-director of the Innocence Project. "It signals a new era in this country that values science and recognizes that truth and justice should triumph over procedural obstacles."
Assistant state attorney Bernie de la Rionda showed the jury George Zimmerman's gun during his closing argument on July 11. Jurors ruled that Zimmerman killed Trayvon Martin with the weapon while he was defending himself
Sanford police confirmed on Thursday that the DOJ asked the agency not to return any pieces of evidence to their owners. Zimmerman was expected to get his firearm back by month's end.
The development is a sign that the criminal section of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division is seriously investigating Zimmerman to determine if federal civil rights charges should be filed.
Zimmerman was acquitted of murder and manslaughter on Sunday in a Florida courtroom, but civil rights violations provide an exception to the U.S. Constitution's protection against double jeopardy after a defendant has been found 'not guilty' in a state or local jurisdiction.
© Rob Hotakainen | McClatchy Washington Bureau
For many U.S. consumers, it's a popular idea: Label packages to let them know what country the meat comes from.
But with his herd of roughly 4,000 including cattle from Mexico, McCan said there's no good reason to segregate the animals when he sells them. All it would do, he said, is create hundreds of millions of dollars of extra handling costs that would get passed on, driving up the price at grocery stores.
"We don't want beef to become a luxury item," said McCan, a fifth-generation rancher from Victoria, Texas.
McCan, now the president-elect of the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, is among a group of cattle producers and meat companies that has sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture for moving ahead in late May with new country-of-origin labeling rules.
In a lawsuit filed July 8 in U.S. District Court in Washington, the groups claim the labels will hurt beef exports and are unconstitutional as "compelled speech" that doesn't advance a government interest.
Backers of the new rules, who say labeling can be done at a minimal cost, are braced for another battle with cattle producers.
On July 18, Detroit became the biggest U.S. city to file for bankruptcy, with an estimated $19 billion in debt. Here’s a look at some staggering facts about Motor City’s population, unemployment rate and more. The data come from a June report called “Proposals for Creditors.
Soon after Detroit emergency manager Kevyn D. Orr and Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R) approved a bankruptcy filing Thursday, groups representing the 20,000 retirees reliant on city pensions successfully petitioned a county court to effectively freeze the bankruptcy process.
Now, city and state officials, who say the court ruling will not affect their plans, are asking a federal judge to hold hearings early this week to validate the bankruptcy and move forward with a strategy for Detroit to discharge much of its estimated $19 billion debt.
Orr has promised that retired city workers, police officers and firefighters will not see pensions or health benefits reduced for at least six months. But on Sunday, he said those retirement benefits will have to be cut down the road.
Comment: "The "no money" pretext is a lie. The deficit of Detroit stands at $327 million. In comparison, a handful of billionaires in the state have a net worth of $24 billion, close to 75 times the budget deficit. A mere ten percent surtax on the wealthiest nine individuals in Michigan would cover the city's deficit 7 times over. Wall Street giants such as Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and UBS have extracted more than $474 million from the city in fees related to the sale of debt, according to a report from Bloomberg News."
Financial dictator of Detroit will institute slash and burn policy to benefit banksters
US: 20 Things We Can Learn About The Future Of America From The Death Of Detroit
Comment: USDA proposes meat labels that some say provide too much information