Showing posts with label Assaults. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Assaults. Show all posts
Saturday, March 15, 2014
Thursday, February 27, 2014
New Assaults on American Law
In the months since Edward Snowden revealed the nature and extent of the spying that the National Security Agency (NSA) has been perpetrating upon Americans and foreigners, some of the NSA’s most troublesome behavior has not been a part of the public debate. This behavior constitutes the government’s assaults on the American legal system. Those assaults have been conducted thus far on two fronts, one of which is aimed at lawyers who represent foreign entities here in America, and the other is aimed at lawyers who represent criminal defendants against whom evidence has been obtained unlawfully and presented in court untruthfully.
Investigative reporters at The New York Times recently discovered that the NSA has been listening to the telephone conversations between lawyers at a highly regarded Chicago law firm and their clients in Indonesia. The firm, Mayer Brown, has remained publicly silent about the revelations, as has its client, the government of Indonesia. But it is well known that Mayer Brown represents the government of Indonesia concerning trade regulations that govern exports of cigarettes and shrimp to the U.S. The lawyers on the other side of the bargaining table from Mayer Brown work for the federal government, which also employs, of course, the NSA.
Can the NSA lawfully tell lawyers for the government who are negotiating with Mayer Brown lawyers what it overheard between the Mayer Brown lawyers and their client? The answer, incredibly, is: Yes. Federal rules prohibit the NSA from sharing knowledge with lawyers for the federal government only about persons who have been indicted. In this case, Mayer Brown is attempting to negotiate favorable trade relations between Indonesia and the U.S., and the lawyers for the U.S. have the unfair advantage of knowing in advance the needs, negotiating positions and strategy of their adversaries. In the Obama years, this is how the feds work: secretly, unfairly and in utter derogation of the attorney-client privilege.
For 100 years, that privilege – the right of lawyers and their clients to speak freely and without the knowledge of the government or their adversaries – has been respected in the U.S., until now. Now, we have a lawyer who, as president, uses the NSA to give him advance warning of what his office visitors are about to ask him. And now we have lawyers for the federal government who work for the president and can know of their adversaries’ most intimate client communications.
This is profoundly unfair, as it gives one side a microscope on the plans of the other. It is unwise, too, as clients will be reluctant to open up to counsel when they know that the NSA could spill the beans to the other side. In the adversarial context, for the system to work fairly and effectively, it is vital that clients be free to speak with their lawyers without the slightest fear of government intrusion, particularly when the government is on the other side of the deal or the case.
If you have spoken to a lawyer recently and if that lawyer is dealing with the federal government on your behalf, you can thank the constitutional scholar in the Oval Office for destroying the formerly privileged nature of your conversations.
But that is not the only legal protection that President Obama has destroyed. In 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral argument in a case in which journalists in the pre-Snowden era challenged the government’s spying on them. The government won the case largely because it persuaded the court that the journalists did not have standing to bring the lawsuit because, the court ruled, their fears of being spied upon were only hypothetical: They suspected that their communications with their sources were being monitored, but they couldn’t prove it. In this post-Snowden era, we now know that the journalists in that case were being spied upon.
Nevertheless, during the oral argument in that case, government lawyers told the high court that should government prosecutors acquire from the NSA evidence of criminal behavior against anyone whom they eventually would prosecute and should they wish to use that evidence in the prosecution, the Justice Department would inform defense counsel of the true source of the evidence so that the defendant would have the ability to challenge the evidence.
Yet, last week, in a case in federal court in Oregon, the same Justice Department that told the highest court in the land last year that it would dutifully and truthfully reveal its sources of evidence – as case law requires and even when the source is an NSA wiretap – told a federal district court judge that it had no need or intention of doing so. If this practice of using NSA wiretaps as the original source of evidence in criminal cases and keeping that information from the defendants against whom it is used is permitted, we will have yet another loss of liberty.
Federal law requires that criminal prosecutions be commenced after articulable suspicion about the crime and the defendant. Prosecutions cannot be commenced by roving through intelligence data obtained through extra-constitutional means. That is the moral equivalent of throwing a dart at a dart board that contains the names of potential defendants and prosecuting the person whose name the dart hits.
For the past 75 years, federal prosecutors have not been permitted to use unlawfully obtained evidence in criminal cases, and they have been required to state truthfully the sources of their evidence so that its lawfulness can be tested. This rule generally has served to keep law enforcement from breaking the laws it has sworn to uphold by denying to its agents the fruits of their own unlawful activity.
Liberty is rarely lost overnight. It is lost slowly and in the name of safety. In the name of keeping us safe, the feds have spied on the lawyers who negotiate with them, lied to the lawyers whose clients they are prosecuting and misrepresented their behavior to the Supreme Court. As far as the public record reveals, they have not corrected that misrepresentation. They have done all of this in utter defiance of well-settled law and procedures and constitutional safeguards.
What will they do next?
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Read more by Andrew P. Napolitano
- A New Assault on Freedom of the Press – February 12th, 2014
- Presidential Placebo – January 22nd, 2014
- Spying on Congress – January 8th, 2014
- Almost Orwellian – December 18th, 2013
- A Conspiracy So Vast – December 11th, 2013
New Assaults on American Law
Monday, February 10, 2014
Sexual assaults by US military in Japan unlikely to end in prison
Press TV
February 9, 2014
U.S. Sec. of Defense Hagel said there is no “one simple answer” to the ethical crisis gripping the US military.
The majority of the US military personnel stationed in Japan who were charged with serious sexual violations escaped prison and received light punishments, according to a new report.
US military commanders in Japan increasingly are resolving sexual assault cases through nonjudicial punishment rather than courts-martial, resulting in light punishments, the Associated Press has found.
The AP obtained more than 1,000 documents of sex-crime cases involving US military personnel stationed in Japan, following Freedom of Information Act requests filed with the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines and the Naval Criminal Investigative Service.
The documents, filed between 2005 and early 2013, show that out of 473 Marines and Navy sailors accused of sex offenses, 179 were given a small punishment, and only 68 went to prison.
The Air Force was the most lenient as 21 sexual offenders were punished with nothing more than a letter of reprimand.
Of more than 620 serious sex-crime allegations against US military personnel in Japan, at least 323 of the alleged victims also were in the military. Civilians were the accusers in 94 cases, but in nearly 200 cases the alleged victim’s status was unclear.
Losing confidence in the US justice system, victims often refused to cooperate with investigators.
On Friday, US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel said there is no “one simple answer” to the ethical crisis gripping the US military and vowed to get to the bottom of a trend of embarrassing disclosures.
All service branches of the US military have been dealing with a series of scandals including cases of cheating, alcohol abuse, gambling, drugs use, and sexual misconduct which surfaced over the past months.
This article was posted: Sunday, February 9, 2014 at 12:09 pm
Sexual assaults by US military in Japan unlikely to end in prison
Friday, December 27, 2013
Reported sexual assaults in US military jumped by 50% in 2013
Reported sexual assaults in the US military increased by over 50 percent in 2013, new data reveals. The boost punctuates a year filled with damning disclosures of a culture that has failed to protect the enlisted from systemic levels of sexual violence.
Data obtained by AP shows there were more than 5,000 sexual assault reports during the 2013 fiscal year, which ended on Sept. 30. By contrast, there were 3,374 incidents reported in 2012.
Of the total reports in 2013, around 10 percent involved incidents that happened before the victim was officially in the military – up from 4 percent in 2012. The increase in cases has led military officials to suggest there is more confidence among service members in reporting incidents of sexual assault than in the past.
“Given the multiple data points, we assess that this is more reporting,” said Col. Alan R. Metzler, deputy director of the Pentagon’s sexual assault prevention and response office, according to AP. Metzler said that more victims are stepping up to make official complaints instead of simply seeking medical care while avoiding formal accusations.
Pentagon officials announced in May that sexual assault incidents have increased by 35 percent between 2010 and 2012, bringing the annual total to 26,000 cases of some type of unwanted sexual contact or sexual assault last year. The results came via an anonymous survey.
Distributed by RINF Alternative News
RINF Alternative News | Independent Media
Reported sexual assaults in US military jumped by 50% in 2013
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Egypt"s conflict enters new phase after assaults
Egyptian security forces clear a sit-in by supporters of ousted Islamist President Mohammed Morsi in the eastern Nasr City district of Cairo, Egypt, Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2013. Egyptian security forces, backed by armored cars and bulldozers, moved on Wednesday to clear two sit-in camps by supporters of the country’s ousted President Mohammed Morsi, showering protesters with tear gas as the sound of gunfire rang out at both sites. (AP Photo/Ahmed Gomaa)
Egyptian security forces clear a sit-in by supporters of ousted Islamist President Mohammed Morsi in the eastern Nasr City district of Cairo, Egypt, Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2013. Egyptian security forces, backed by armored cars and bulldozers, moved on Wednesday to clear two sit-in camps by supporters of the country’s ousted President Mohammed Morsi, showering protesters with tear gas as the sound of gunfire rang out at both sites. (AP Photo/Ahmed Gomaa)
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CAIRO (AP) — Egypt entered a new phase of uncertainty Wednesday after security forces drove out supporters of President Mohammed Morsi from two sprawling encampments where they had been camped out for six weeks demanding the Islamist leader’s reinstatement. The move, which left dozens of protesters dead and saw the arrest of several leaders of Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood, has left the fundamentalist movement dangerously isolated. It also prompted Vice President Vice President Mohamed ElBaradei, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and pro-reform leader in the interim government, to resign in protest over the violent crackdown as the military-backed leadership imposed a monthlong state of emergency and nighttime curfew.
WHY NOW?
The interim administration that took over after Morsi was toppled on July 3 has been warning for days that it planned to crackdown on the tent cities, which clogged intersections on opposite sides of the Egyptian capital. The government accused the protesters of frightening residents in the neighborhoods, sparking violence and disrupting traffic. Military chief Gen. Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, who ousted Morsi, called for mass rallies last month to show support action against the protesters. Millions turned up on July 26 to declare their support. The government later said diplomatic efforts had failed and the decision to clear the sit-ins was “irreversible.” Morsi’s supporters fortified their positions and even more people flooded the camps after plans for a crackdown on Monday morning were leaked to the media. Police announced they were postponing the decision but did not give a new date.
WHAT LED TO THIS?
Morsi was Egypt’s first democratically elected leader after winning the first post-Hosni Mubarak presidential election with just under 52 percent of the vote. His rise to the helm of power was a sharp reversal for the Muslim Brotherhood, repressed for decades under Mubarak’s rule, and it was part of a general rise to power of Islamists following the Arab Spring wave of revolutions that led to the ouster of Mubarak and autocratic leaders in Tunisia and Libya. But Morsi faced a backlash as liberal and secular activists accused him and the Muslim Brotherhood of trying to monopolize power and failing to implement much-needed social and economic reforms. Morsi and his backers argued they were doomed to fail because of constant protests and efforts to undermine his government. His government also drew criticism over a series of charges and complaints against activists, journalists and TV personalities, including well-known satirist Bassem Youssef, for insulting Morsi and even sometimes for insulting Islam. An activist group called Tamarod, or Rebel in Arabic, drew millions to the streets to call for Morsi’s ouster on June 30, the anniversary of his inauguration. The powerful military responded by taking Morsi into custody on July 3 and forming an interim civilian leadership.
WHAT ARE THE MAIN STICKING POINTS BLOCKING NEGOTIATIONS?
The Muslim Brotherhood, which rose to power and won a series of elections after Mubarak’s ouster, backs Morsi and had vowed to maintain the protest camps until he was reinstated. The Islamists have rejected the military-backed political process, which calls for amending the constitution adopted last year and holding parliamentary and presidential elections early next year. International diplomatic efforts to promote reconciliation, including phone calls and visits by senior U.S. and European diplomats, have failed.
The interim administration and liberal and secular activists who led the drive to oust Morsi say the move against Egypt’s first democratically elected president was justified because he was abusing his power and the country needed a second chance at democracy. Authorities also have cracked down on Muslim Brotherhood leaders, detaining several key figures and accusing them of inciting violence.
WHAT IS THE U.S. POSITION?
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry joined other Western and mainly Muslim countries in condemning the violence. He said it had dealt a “serious blow” to political reconciliation efforts and urged Egypt’s interim leaders to take a step back and calm the situation. But Obama administration officials signaled no change in their policy toward Egypt. Washington has avoided declaring Morsi’s ouster a coup, a move that would force the administration to suspend $ 1.3 billion in annual military aid to the nation. White House and State Department officials said the U.S. role was largely to encourage the interim government to fulfill its promises to enact political reform.
HAS THE VIOLENCE GENERATED ANY SYMPATHY FOR MORSI’S SUPPORTERS?
Most Egyptians are Muslim, but there is widespread antipathy toward the Muslim Brotherhood among moderates who feared Morsi and his allies were trying to impose a stricter version of Islamic law in the country. Still many object to the brutal crackdown and argue stability cannot be restored without participation of Islamists in the political process. ElBaradei’s resignation was the first sign of a crack in the government’s position. The former head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency was named only last month as interim President Adly Mansour’s deputy for foreign relations. In his resignation letter, he wrote that he is not prepared to be held responsible for a “single drop of blood,” and lamented that Egypt is more polarized than when he took office, according to a copy that was emailed to The Associated Press.
WHAT’S NEXT?
It’s hard to tell. Several more Muslim Brotherhood leaders, including the powerful Mohammed el-Beltagy and Essam el-Erian, were arrested after security forces swept away the two protest camps and the movement may struggle to regroup as pro-Morsi protesters from the camp were scattered. The government has declared a state of emergency and imposed a nighttime curfew in a bid to stem the violence, but sporadic clashes continued through the evening. Anger over Morsi’s ouster already has led to an increase in Islamic militant violence in the northern half of the Sinai Peninsula that borders Israel and the Gaza Strip, and growing anger over the crackdown and deaths of scores of civilians could be exploited by extremists to stoke low-level violence there and elsewhere in the country.
Egypt"s conflict enters new phase after assaults
Sunday, June 16, 2013
Assaults Against Federal Park Rangers Up 38
Park rangers, wildlife refuge workers and U.S. Park Police experienced more assaults and threats from visitors last year than in 2011, according to a group that represents federal resource workers.
A total of 591 incidents were reported by six land and water agencies in 2012, up 38 percent from the previous year, the group says. More than one-quarter of the incidents involved some sort of violence against the employee or officer, the report by the advocacy group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility says.
More than half of 100 reported incidents against U.S. Park Police involved violence, the report said, including an incident where a suspected drunk driver tried to run over a police officer.
The report is set to be released on Monday. The Associated Press obtained a copy in advance. The report is based on figures obtained from the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management and other agencies.
The report says 2012 began violently, with the New Year’s Day shooting death of a park ranger at Mount Rainier National Park in Washington state, the first ranger killed in the line of duty in a decade.
That same month, a note was a left at a Texas wildlife refuge visitor center that included racist remarks and a threat to burn down the center. In September, someone took a shot at a land management worker driving an agency vehicle at an Arizona recreation area.
Other incidents include assaults on law enforcement officers, resisting arrest and threats of violence, including at least one that resulted in a court-imposed restraining order.
Jeff Ruch, executive director of PEER, said the report shows that incidents of violence and abuse directed against rangers and other federal employees are becoming more common.
“The saying `it’s not easy being green’ is becoming truer with each passing year,” said Ruch.
Employees cited a number of factors for assaults or threats, including conflicts over federal land-management policies, growing use of public lands for meth labs and marijuana plantations, and deeper penetration of remote backcountry areas by off-road vehicles.
The figures do not show a clear pattern reflecting rules allowing loaded firearms in national parks and refuges starting in 2010, Ruch said. PEER opposed the law that allowed loaded guns, saying it could increase dangers for park rangers and visitors.
The U.S. Park Police, which patrols national parkland in Washington, D.C., New York and San Francisco, experienced a 43 percent jump in assaults and threats.
© Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Assaults Against Federal Park Rangers Up 38
Sunday, May 12, 2013
Sexual Assaults and Nuclear Missiles: What"s the Matter With the Military?
After years of repeated reports of sexual assaults — and years of promises to prevent them, and then years of studies and commissions to find the best way of doing so — a Defense Department study released Tuesday estimates that some 26,000 people in the military were sexually assaulted in the last fiscal year, up from about 19,000 the year before.
Moreover, it turns out the Air Force lieutenant colonel in charge of preventing sexual assault has been arrested for … sexual assault. According to the police report, a drunken Lt. Col. Jeff Krusinski allegedly approached a woman in a parking lot in Arlington, Va., Sunday night, and grabbed her breasts and buttocks.
Why has it been so difficult for the Air Force or the Defense Department to remedy this problem?
Speaking of which, the Air Force has just removed from duty seventeen launch officers at the Minot nuclear missile base in North Dakota — one of three bases responsible for controlling, and, if necessary, launching, strategic nuclear missiles — for violating weapons safety rules. The base commander characterized their negligence as “ One officer was found to have intentionally broken a safety rule that could have compromised the secret codes enabling missiles to be launched. Secretary of the Air Force Michael Donley points to the removal of the seventeen as evidence that the Air Force has strengthened its oversight of the nuclear force. And he explains that members of the launch crew are usually relatively junior officers with limited service experience. Reassuring? Further steps will be taken to prevent one of our missiles from accidentally causing a nuclear holocaust. But I hope the Air Force does a better job remedying this problem than it’s done preventing sexual assaults. ROBERT B. REICH, Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley, was Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration. Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the last century. He has written thirteen books, including the best sellers “Aftershock” and “The Work of Nations.” His latest is an e-book, “Beyond Outrage,” now available in paperback. He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine and chairman of Common Cause. Follow Robert Reich on Twitter: www.twitter.com/RBReich
Sexual Assaults and Nuclear Missiles: What"s the Matter With the Military?
Saturday, May 11, 2013
Sexual Assaults and Nuclear Missiles: What"s the Matter With the Military?
After years of repeated reports of sexual assaults — and years of promises to prevent them, and then years of studies and commissions to find the best way of doing so — a Defense Department study released Tuesday estimates that some 26,000 people in the military were sexually assaulted in the last fiscal year, up from about 19,000 the year before.
Moreover, it turns out the Air Force lieutenant colonel in charge of preventing sexual assault has been arrested for … sexual assault. According to the police report, a drunken Lt. Col. Jeff Krusinski allegedly approached a woman in a parking lot in Arlington, Va., Sunday night, and grabbed her breasts and buttocks.
Why has it been so difficult for the Air Force or the Defense Department to remedy this problem?
Speaking of which, the Air Force has just removed from duty seventeen launch officers at the Minot nuclear missile base in North Dakota — one of three bases responsible for controlling, and, if necessary, launching, strategic nuclear missiles — for violating weapons safety rules. The base commander characterized their negligence as “ One officer was found to have intentionally broken a safety rule that could have compromised the secret codes enabling missiles to be launched. Secretary of the Air Force Michael Donley points to the removal of the seventeen as evidence that the Air Force has strengthened its oversight of the nuclear force. And he explains that members of the launch crew are usually relatively junior officers with limited service experience. Reassuring? Further steps will be taken to prevent one of our missiles from accidentally causing a nuclear holocaust. But I hope the Air Force does a better job remedying this problem than it’s done preventing sexual assaults. ROBERT B. REICH, Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley, was Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration. Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the last century. He has written thirteen books, including the best sellers “Aftershock” and “The Work of Nations.” His latest is an e-book, “Beyond Outrage,” now available in paperback. He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine and chairman of Common Cause. Follow Robert Reich on Twitter: www.twitter.com/RBReich
Sexual Assaults and Nuclear Missiles: What"s the Matter With the Military?
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