The DEA sex party scandal just got worse
U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents in Colombia were taking part in alleged sex parties with prostitutes funded by drug cartels years earlier than previously known, U.S. lawmakers said on Tuesday.
Several DEA agents were taking part in these parties in Bogota as early as 2001, said a summary of a DEA report released by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform at a hearing on the misconduct....
Showing posts with label WoD. Show all posts
Showing posts with label WoD. Show all posts
Sunday, January 19, 2014
CONFIRMED: The DEA Struck A Deal With Mexico's Most Notorious Drug Cartel
An investigation by El Universal found that between the years 2000 and 2012, the U.S. government had an arrangement with Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel that allowed the organization to smuggle billions of dollars of drugs while Sinaloa provided information on rival cartels.
Sinaloa, led by Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, supplies 80% of the drugs entering the Chicago area and has a presence in cities across the U.S.
There have long been allegations that Guzman, considered to be "the world’s most powerful drug trafficker," coordinates with American authorities.
But the El Universal investigation is the first to publish court documents that include corroborating testimony from a DEA agent and a Justice Department official. ...
Emails Show Extensive Collaboration Between EPA, Environmentalist Orgs
Internal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) emails show extensive collaboration between top agency officials and leading environmentalist groups, including overt efforts to coordinate messaging and pressure the fossil fuel industry.
The emails, obtained by the Energy and Environment Legal Institute (EELI) through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, could fuel an ongoing controversy over EPA policies that critics say are biased against traditional sources of energy.
Emails show EPA used official events to help environmentalist groups gather signatures for petitions on agency rulemaking, incorporated advance copies of letters drafted by those groups into official statements, and worked with environmentalists to publicly pressure executives of at least one energy company.
Nancy Grantham, director of public affairs for EPA Region 1, which covers New England, asked an organizer for the Sierra Club’s New Hampshire chapter to share the group’s agenda so EPA could adjust its messaging accordingly in an email dated March 12, 2012....
An investigation by El Universal found that between the years 2000 and 2012, the U.S. government had an arrangement with Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel that allowed the organization to smuggle billions of dollars of drugs while Sinaloa provided information on rival cartels.
Sinaloa, led by Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, supplies 80% of the drugs entering the Chicago area and has a presence in cities across the U.S.
There have long been allegations that Guzman, considered to be "the world’s most powerful drug trafficker," coordinates with American authorities.
But the El Universal investigation is the first to publish court documents that include corroborating testimony from a DEA agent and a Justice Department official. ...
Emails Show Extensive Collaboration Between EPA, Environmentalist Orgs
Internal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) emails show extensive collaboration between top agency officials and leading environmentalist groups, including overt efforts to coordinate messaging and pressure the fossil fuel industry.
The emails, obtained by the Energy and Environment Legal Institute (EELI) through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, could fuel an ongoing controversy over EPA policies that critics say are biased against traditional sources of energy.
Emails show EPA used official events to help environmentalist groups gather signatures for petitions on agency rulemaking, incorporated advance copies of letters drafted by those groups into official statements, and worked with environmentalists to publicly pressure executives of at least one energy company.
Nancy Grantham, director of public affairs for EPA Region 1, which covers New England, asked an organizer for the Sierra Club’s New Hampshire chapter to share the group’s agenda so EPA could adjust its messaging accordingly in an email dated March 12, 2012....
Wednesday, September 25, 2013
The DEA Thinks You Have “No Constitutionally Protected Privacy Interest” in Your Confidential Prescription Records
The Drug Enforcement Administration thinks people have “no constitutionally protected privacy interest” in their confidential prescription records, according to a brief filed last month in federal court. That disconcerting statement comes in response to an ACLU lawsuit challenging the DEA’s practice of obtaining private medical information without a warrant. The ACLU has just filed its response brief, explaining to the court why the DEA’s position is both startling and wrong....
...In its latest brief, the DEA ignores these points and instead argues that the mere fact that our clients’ prescription records are held in a database maintained by a third party—the State of Oregon—means that they have somehow given up their privacy interest in the records. Courts have found that no warrant is required for information contained in some kinds of business records like electricity consumption records held by a power company or room registration information held by a motel. This is because, in theory, people have voluntarily given up their privacy interest in information when they turn it over to a third party. We disagree with that principle, called the “third party doctrine,” in many situations, because when people provide sensitive information to a third party for a specific purpose, they typically do not intend for law enforcement to have unfettered access to it. The principle is particularly offensive in this case....
The Drug Enforcement Administration thinks people have “no constitutionally protected privacy interest” in their confidential prescription records, according to a brief filed last month in federal court. That disconcerting statement comes in response to an ACLU lawsuit challenging the DEA’s practice of obtaining private medical information without a warrant. The ACLU has just filed its response brief, explaining to the court why the DEA’s position is both startling and wrong....
...In its latest brief, the DEA ignores these points and instead argues that the mere fact that our clients’ prescription records are held in a database maintained by a third party—the State of Oregon—means that they have somehow given up their privacy interest in the records. Courts have found that no warrant is required for information contained in some kinds of business records like electricity consumption records held by a power company or room registration information held by a motel. This is because, in theory, people have voluntarily given up their privacy interest in information when they turn it over to a third party. We disagree with that principle, called the “third party doctrine,” in many situations, because when people provide sensitive information to a third party for a specific purpose, they typically do not intend for law enforcement to have unfettered access to it. The principle is particularly offensive in this case....
Wednesday, September 18, 2013
The Rational Choices of Crack Addicts
...Drug warriors may be skeptical of his work, but some other scientists are impressed. “Carl’s overall argument is persuasive and driven by the data,” said Craig R. Rush, a psychologist at the University of Kentucky who studies stimulant abuse. “He’s not saying that drug abuse isn’t harmful, but he’s showing that drugs don’t turn people into lunatics. They can stop using drugs when provided with alternative reinforcers.”
A similar assessment comes from Dr. David Nutt, a British expert on drug abuse. “I have a great deal of sympathy with Carl’s views,” said Dr. Nutt, a professor of neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London. “Addiction always has a social element, and this is magnified in societies with little in the way of work or other ways to find fulfillment.”
So why do we keep focusing so much on specific drugs? One reason is convenience: It’s much simpler for politicians and journalists to focus on the evils of a drug than to grapple with the underlying social problems. But Dr. Hart also puts some of the blame on scientists.
“Eighty to 90 percent of people are not negatively affected by drugs, but in the scientific literature nearly 100 percent of the reports are negative,” Dr. Hart said. “There’s a skewed focus on pathology. We scientists know that we get more money if we keep telling Congress that we’re solving this terrible problem. We’ve played a less than honorable role in the war on drugs.”
...Drug warriors may be skeptical of his work, but some other scientists are impressed. “Carl’s overall argument is persuasive and driven by the data,” said Craig R. Rush, a psychologist at the University of Kentucky who studies stimulant abuse. “He’s not saying that drug abuse isn’t harmful, but he’s showing that drugs don’t turn people into lunatics. They can stop using drugs when provided with alternative reinforcers.”
A similar assessment comes from Dr. David Nutt, a British expert on drug abuse. “I have a great deal of sympathy with Carl’s views,” said Dr. Nutt, a professor of neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London. “Addiction always has a social element, and this is magnified in societies with little in the way of work or other ways to find fulfillment.”
So why do we keep focusing so much on specific drugs? One reason is convenience: It’s much simpler for politicians and journalists to focus on the evils of a drug than to grapple with the underlying social problems. But Dr. Hart also puts some of the blame on scientists.
“Eighty to 90 percent of people are not negatively affected by drugs, but in the scientific literature nearly 100 percent of the reports are negative,” Dr. Hart said. “There’s a skewed focus on pathology. We scientists know that we get more money if we keep telling Congress that we’re solving this terrible problem. We’ve played a less than honorable role in the war on drugs.”
Sunday, September 08, 2013
The Massive Racial Disparities In Arrests For Pot Possession
-- Blacks are 3.73 times more likely to be arrest for pot possession than whites. The regions with the largest disparity: the Northeast and Midwest. The region with the smallest: the West.
-- The states with the highest racial disparity in per capita pot possession arrests: Iowa (blacks are 8.34 times more likely to be arrested), Minnesota (8.05), Illinois (7.81), Wisconsin (7.56), and Kentucky (5.95).
-- The black arrest rate for pot possession is below 300 per 100,000 residents in only two states, Hawaii and Massachusetts. The white arrest rate for pot possession is above 300 per 100,000 residents in only three states: Wyoming, Nebraska, and Alaska. The black arrest rate was below 500 in only 10 states. The white arrest rate was over 400 in zero states.
-- The black/white arrest rate disparity for pot possession has only grown over the last 10 years. The disparity has grown most in Alaska, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Ohio.
A common rejoinder to the racial disparities in arrest rates or incarceration rates is that, proportionately, black people commit more crimes than white white people. But that argument doesn't explain away these figures. These, again, are for pot possession. Meaning, these people were arrested with enough pot for personal use, but not enough to charge them with distribution. In other words, most of these people were arrested for using. And as the ACLU report points out, numerous studies have shown that blacks and whites use marijuana at about the same rate. In fact, in 2010, 34 percent of whites reported having used marijuana in the previous year, versus just 27 percent of blacks....
-- Blacks are 3.73 times more likely to be arrest for pot possession than whites. The regions with the largest disparity: the Northeast and Midwest. The region with the smallest: the West.
-- The states with the highest racial disparity in per capita pot possession arrests: Iowa (blacks are 8.34 times more likely to be arrested), Minnesota (8.05), Illinois (7.81), Wisconsin (7.56), and Kentucky (5.95).
-- The black arrest rate for pot possession is below 300 per 100,000 residents in only two states, Hawaii and Massachusetts. The white arrest rate for pot possession is above 300 per 100,000 residents in only three states: Wyoming, Nebraska, and Alaska. The black arrest rate was below 500 in only 10 states. The white arrest rate was over 400 in zero states.
-- The black/white arrest rate disparity for pot possession has only grown over the last 10 years. The disparity has grown most in Alaska, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Ohio.
A common rejoinder to the racial disparities in arrest rates or incarceration rates is that, proportionately, black people commit more crimes than white white people. But that argument doesn't explain away these figures. These, again, are for pot possession. Meaning, these people were arrested with enough pot for personal use, but not enough to charge them with distribution. In other words, most of these people were arrested for using. And as the ACLU report points out, numerous studies have shown that blacks and whites use marijuana at about the same rate. In fact, in 2010, 34 percent of whites reported having used marijuana in the previous year, versus just 27 percent of blacks....
Monday, September 02, 2013
Drug Agents Use Vast Phone Trove, Eclipsing N.S.A.’s
For at least six years, law enforcement officials working on a counternarcotics program have had routine access, using subpoenas, to an enormous AT&T database that contains the records of decades of Americans’ phone calls — parallel to but covering a far longer time than the National Security Agency’s hotly disputed collection of phone call logs.
The Hemisphere Project, a partnership between federal and local drug officials and AT&T that has not previously been reported, involves an extremely close association between the government and the telecommunications giant.
The government pays AT&T to place its employees in drug-fighting units around the country. Those employees sit alongside Drug Enforcement Administration agents and local detectives and supply them with the phone data from as far back as 1987. ...
...Hemisphere covers every call that passes through an AT&T switch — not just those made by AT&T customers — and includes calls dating back 26 years, according to Hemisphere training slides bearing the logo of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. Some four billion call records are added to the database every day, the slides say; technical specialists say a single call may generate more than one record. Unlike the N.S.A. data, the Hemisphere data includes information on the locations of callers. ...
...The PowerPoint slides outline several “success stories” highlighting the program’s achievements and showing that it is used in investigating a range of crimes, not just drug violations. The slides emphasize the program’s value in tracing suspects who use replacement phones, sometimes called “burner” phones, who switch phone numbers or who are otherwise difficult to locate or identify. ...
Telecom Surveillance Immunity Won’t Get Supreme Court Review
The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to consider a challenge to a 2008 federal law granting immunity to AT&T Inc and other telecommunications companies for helping the government eavesdrop on customers' private phone conversations.
Section 802 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, passed in the wake of the attacks of September 11, 2001, bars a variety of civil actions against anyone providing assistance to the intelligence community.
Only One Big Telecom CEO Refused To Cave To The NSA ... And He's Been In Jail For 4 Years
...Nacchio alleged that the government stopped offering the company lucrative contracts after Qwest refused to cooperate with a National Security Agency surveillance program in February 2001....
...Back in 2006 Leslie Cauley of USA Today, citing multiple people with direct knowledge of the arrangement, reported that shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks America's three largest telecoms signed contracts to provide the NSA with detailed call records from hundreds of millions of people across the country.
Cauley noted that Qwest's refusal to participate "left the NSA with a hole in its database" since the company served local phone service to 14 million customers in 14 states....
For at least six years, law enforcement officials working on a counternarcotics program have had routine access, using subpoenas, to an enormous AT&T database that contains the records of decades of Americans’ phone calls — parallel to but covering a far longer time than the National Security Agency’s hotly disputed collection of phone call logs.
The Hemisphere Project, a partnership between federal and local drug officials and AT&T that has not previously been reported, involves an extremely close association between the government and the telecommunications giant.
The government pays AT&T to place its employees in drug-fighting units around the country. Those employees sit alongside Drug Enforcement Administration agents and local detectives and supply them with the phone data from as far back as 1987. ...
...Hemisphere covers every call that passes through an AT&T switch — not just those made by AT&T customers — and includes calls dating back 26 years, according to Hemisphere training slides bearing the logo of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. Some four billion call records are added to the database every day, the slides say; technical specialists say a single call may generate more than one record. Unlike the N.S.A. data, the Hemisphere data includes information on the locations of callers. ...
...The PowerPoint slides outline several “success stories” highlighting the program’s achievements and showing that it is used in investigating a range of crimes, not just drug violations. The slides emphasize the program’s value in tracing suspects who use replacement phones, sometimes called “burner” phones, who switch phone numbers or who are otherwise difficult to locate or identify. ...
Telecom Surveillance Immunity Won’t Get Supreme Court Review
The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to consider a challenge to a 2008 federal law granting immunity to AT&T Inc and other telecommunications companies for helping the government eavesdrop on customers' private phone conversations.
Section 802 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, passed in the wake of the attacks of September 11, 2001, bars a variety of civil actions against anyone providing assistance to the intelligence community.
Only One Big Telecom CEO Refused To Cave To The NSA ... And He's Been In Jail For 4 Years
...Nacchio alleged that the government stopped offering the company lucrative contracts after Qwest refused to cooperate with a National Security Agency surveillance program in February 2001....
...Back in 2006 Leslie Cauley of USA Today, citing multiple people with direct knowledge of the arrangement, reported that shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks America's three largest telecoms signed contracts to provide the NSA with detailed call records from hundreds of millions of people across the country.
Cauley noted that Qwest's refusal to participate "left the NSA with a hole in its database" since the company served local phone service to 14 million customers in 14 states....
Sunday, April 28, 2013
Boise Police Seize Children of Marijuana Activists
Three marijuana advocates in Boise, Idaho, had their children taken by Child Protective Services this week after police found marijuana in one of the family's homes.
According to an item posted today by one of the parents on Compassionate Idaho, a medical marijuana site, Lindsey Rinehart and her husband Josh Rinehart went hiking with friend Sarah Caldwell earlier this week. When they came back, their kids had been taken.
Officers with the Boise Police Department had arrived at the house while they were gone to conduct a "Well Child Check," allegedly at the behest of a school administrator. (I've requested information from the BPD, and will update this post when I hear back.) "The BPD intimidated our babysitter/friend and gained access to our home," Lindsey Rinehart wrote. "Upon entering, and seeing that the house was Fine, the kids are Fine, they decided to go to my room." That's where police found the marijuana that Rinehart uses to treat her MS, and decided to call Child Protective Services....
Three marijuana advocates in Boise, Idaho, had their children taken by Child Protective Services this week after police found marijuana in one of the family's homes.
According to an item posted today by one of the parents on Compassionate Idaho, a medical marijuana site, Lindsey Rinehart and her husband Josh Rinehart went hiking with friend Sarah Caldwell earlier this week. When they came back, their kids had been taken.
Officers with the Boise Police Department had arrived at the house while they were gone to conduct a "Well Child Check," allegedly at the behest of a school administrator. (I've requested information from the BPD, and will update this post when I hear back.) "The BPD intimidated our babysitter/friend and gained access to our home," Lindsey Rinehart wrote. "Upon entering, and seeing that the house was Fine, the kids are Fine, they decided to go to my room." That's where police found the marijuana that Rinehart uses to treat her MS, and decided to call Child Protective Services....
Saturday, August 04, 2012
Truck owner wants DEA to pay up after botched sting
...Commandeered by one of his drivers, who was secretly working with federal agents, the truck had been hauling marijuana from the border as part of an undercover operation. And without Patty's knowledge, the Drug Enforcement Administration was paying his driver, Lawrence Chapa, to use the truck to bust traffickers.
At least 17 hours before that early morning phone call, Chapa was shot dead in front of more than a dozen law enforcement officers - all of them taken by surprise by hijackers trying to steal the red Kenworth T600 truck and its load of pot.
In the confusion of the attack in northwest Harris County, compounded by officers in the operation not all knowing each other, a Houston policeman shot and wounded a Harris County sheriff's deputy....
...Commandeered by one of his drivers, who was secretly working with federal agents, the truck had been hauling marijuana from the border as part of an undercover operation. And without Patty's knowledge, the Drug Enforcement Administration was paying his driver, Lawrence Chapa, to use the truck to bust traffickers.
At least 17 hours before that early morning phone call, Chapa was shot dead in front of more than a dozen law enforcement officers - all of them taken by surprise by hijackers trying to steal the red Kenworth T600 truck and its load of pot.
In the confusion of the attack in northwest Harris County, compounded by officers in the operation not all knowing each other, a Houston policeman shot and wounded a Harris County sheriff's deputy....
Sunday, July 22, 2012
Spies in the sky signal new age of surveillance
..."If you're concerned about it, maybe there's a reason we should be flying over you, right?" said Douglas McDonald, the company's director of special operations and president of a local chapter of the unmanned vehicle trade group. "But as soon as you lose your kid, get your car stolen or have marijuana growing out at your lake place that's not yours, you'd probably want one of those flying overhead."...
..."If you're concerned about it, maybe there's a reason we should be flying over you, right?" said Douglas McDonald, the company's director of special operations and president of a local chapter of the unmanned vehicle trade group. "But as soon as you lose your kid, get your car stolen or have marijuana growing out at your lake place that's not yours, you'd probably want one of those flying overhead."...
Saturday, July 07, 2012
Florida Cop Fired for Planting Dope, Says He Did That and More Under Orders
...“I advised my supervisor of my findings and my supervisor advised me ‘if I was in your shoes I’d get marijuana from the SWAT closet and add it to what you found,’ ” he said in the letter.
“I again was in fear of losing my job and felt obligated to do as instructed by my supervisor,” he added....
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Under Asset Forfeiture Law, Wisconsin Cops Confiscate Families' Bail Money
...The Greers had been subjected to civil asset forfeiture, a policy that lets police confiscate money and property even if they can only loosely connect them to drug activity. The cash, or revenue from the property seized, often goes back to the coffers of the police department that confiscated it. It's a policy critics say is often abused, but experts told The HuffPost that the way the law is applied to bail money in Brown County is exceptionally unfair.
It took four months for Beverly Greer to get her family's money back, and then only after attorney Andy Williams agreed to take their case. "The family produced the ATM receipts proving that had recently withdrawn the money," Williams says. "Beverly Greer had documentation for her disability check and her tax return. Even then, the police tried to keep their money."
Wisconsin is one of four states (along with Illinois, Kentucky, and Oregon) that prohibits bail bondsmen. So bail must be paid either in cash, with a registered check, cashier's check or credit card. In fact, Donna Kuchler, a Wisconsin criminal defense attorney based in Waukesha, said police aren't allowed to insist on cash.
"I would be suspicious of why they would do that," Kuchler says. "I had a case last year in Fond du Lac County where they tried to say my client could only pay in cash. My guess is that they probably intended to do the same thing that happened here....
Sunday, January 01, 2012
Ron Paul Had Accurate Conspiracy Theory: CIA Was Tied To Drug Traffickers
...Earlier this week, I looked into Paul's claim in the same speech that the war on drugs had racist origins and that the medical community played a role in lobbying for drug prohibitions. That charge was more or less accurate.
So is Paul's claim about the CIA and drug trafficking, a connection I explore in the book "This Is Your Country On Drugs: The Secret History of Getting High in America." (An excerpt of the chapter on the CIA appeared in The Root.) The following is drawn from my book.
Since at least the 1940s, the American government has organized and supported insurgent armies for the purpose of overthrowing some presumably hostile foreign regime. In Italy, the United States helped pit the Corsican and Sicilian mobs against the Fascists and then the Communists. In China, it aided Chiang Kai-shek's Kuomintang in its struggle against Mao Zedong's communist forces. In Afghanistan, it once backed the mujahedeen in their fight against the Soviet Union and today backs warlords in opposition to the mujahedeen.
All of these and other U.S.-supported groups profited, or still profit, heavily from the drug trade. One of the principal arguments made by the Drug Enforcement Administration in support of the global drug war is that the illegal drug trade funds violent, stateless organizations. The DEA refers specifically to al Qaeda and the Taliban, but the same method of fundraising has long been used by other violent, stateless actors whom the United States befriended....
...Earlier this week, I looked into Paul's claim in the same speech that the war on drugs had racist origins and that the medical community played a role in lobbying for drug prohibitions. That charge was more or less accurate.
So is Paul's claim about the CIA and drug trafficking, a connection I explore in the book "This Is Your Country On Drugs: The Secret History of Getting High in America." (An excerpt of the chapter on the CIA appeared in The Root.) The following is drawn from my book.
Since at least the 1940s, the American government has organized and supported insurgent armies for the purpose of overthrowing some presumably hostile foreign regime. In Italy, the United States helped pit the Corsican and Sicilian mobs against the Fascists and then the Communists. In China, it aided Chiang Kai-shek's Kuomintang in its struggle against Mao Zedong's communist forces. In Afghanistan, it once backed the mujahedeen in their fight against the Soviet Union and today backs warlords in opposition to the mujahedeen.
All of these and other U.S.-supported groups profited, or still profit, heavily from the drug trade. One of the principal arguments made by the Drug Enforcement Administration in support of the global drug war is that the illegal drug trade funds violent, stateless organizations. The DEA refers specifically to al Qaeda and the Taliban, but the same method of fundraising has long been used by other violent, stateless actors whom the United States befriended....
Saturday, December 31, 2011
Ron Paul: Drug War In U.S. Has Racist Origins
...The reaction of the American government, and its people, to drug use was -- and still is -- a complex mix of factors, involving lobbying by the medical community, pharmaceutical companies, the alcohol industry, temperance advocates, and religious movements. Historically, the argument has played out -- and continues to play out -- amid a backdrop of racism and class antagonism. Racism and bigotry were generally not the drivers of prohibition movements, but instead were the weapons used by temperance advocates to achieve their ends. The movement to ban alcohol, for instance, gained its strongest adherents without resorting to bigotry, but when World War I broke out, the movement was quick to tie beer and booze to instantly despised German immigrants, pushing the effort over the Constitutional hump....
Sunday, December 11, 2011
U.S. Agents Launder Mexican Profits of Drug Cartels
WASHINGTON — Undercover American narcotics agents have laundered or smuggled millions of dollars in drug proceeds as part of Washington’s expanding role in Mexico’s fight against drug cartels, according to current and former federal law enforcement officials.
The agents, primarily with the Drug Enforcement Administration, have handled shipments of hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal cash across borders, those officials said, to identify how criminal organizations move their money, where they keep their assets and, most important, who their leaders are.
They said agents had deposited the drug proceeds in accounts designated by traffickers, or in shell accounts set up by agents.
The officials said that while the D.E.A. conducted such operations in other countries, it began doing so in Mexico only in the past few years. The high-risk activities raise delicate questions about the agency’s effectiveness in bringing down drug kingpins, underscore diplomatic concerns about Mexican sovereignty, and blur the line between surveillance and facilitating crime. As it launders drug money, the agency often allows cartels to continue their operations over months or even years before making seizures or arrests....
Sunday, October 16, 2011
We fabricated drug charges against innocent people to meet arrest quotas, former detective testifies
A former NYPD narcotics detective snared in a corruption scandal testified it was common practice to fabricate drug charges against innocent people to meet arrest quotas.
The bombshell testimony from Stephen Anderson is the first public account of the twisted culture behind the false arrests in the Brooklyn South and Queens narc squads, which led to the arrests of eight cops and a massive shakeup.
Anderson, testifying under a cooperation agreement with prosecutors, was busted for planting cocaine, a practice known as "flaking," on four men in a Queens bar in 2008 to help out fellow cop Henry Tavarez, whose buy-and-bust activity had been low.
"Tavarez was ... was worried about getting sent back [to patrol] and, you know, the supervisors getting on his case," he recounted at the corruption trial of Brooklyn South narcotics Detective Jason Arbeeny.
"I had decided to give him [Tavarez] the drugs to help him out so that he could say he had a buy," Anderson testified last week in Brooklyn Supreme Court.
He made clear he wasn't about to pass off the two legit arrests he had made in the bar to Tavarez.
"As a detective, you still have a number to reach while you are in the narcotics division," he said....
Saturday, August 13, 2011
Documents: Feds allegedly allowed Sinaloa cartel to move cocaine into U.S. for information
U.S. federal agents allegedly allowed the Sinaloa drug cartel to traffic several tons of cocaine into the United States in exchange for information about rival cartels, according to court documents filed in a U.S. federal court.
The allegations are part of the defense of Vicente Zambada-Niebla, who was extradited to the United States to face drug-trafficking charges in Chicago. He is also a top lieutenant of drug kingpin Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman and the son of Ismael "Mayo" Zambada-Garcia, believed to be the brains behind the Sinaloa cartel.
The case could prove to be a bombshell on par with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives' "Operation Fast and Furious," except that instead of U.S. guns being allowed to walk across the border, the Sinaloa cartel was allowed to bring drugs into the United States. Zambada-Niebla claims he was permitted to smuggle drugs from 2004 until his arrest in 2009....
Albert Camus spoke a terrible truth. “I know something worse than hate: abstract love.” In the name of abstract love, in the name of God and Country, in the name of saving the youth from the drug, in the name of the proletariat, in the name of abstractions, our politicians and war policy makers have committed the most atrocious crimes on human beings, who are not abstractions, who are bones and flesh. That is what our country is living and suffering today: in the name of an abstract goodness, we are suffering the opposite: the horror of war and violence, of innocents dead, disappeared, and mutilated.
-- Javier Sicilia
-- Javier Sicilia
Friday, August 05, 2011
Trafficking defendant: I was a DEA informer
Lawyers for the drug- trafficking son of one of Mexico's most powerful kingpins contend he helped run the Sinaloa Cartel — and was a fugitive from charges in the United States — while at the same time acting as an informant for U.S. agents.
Jesus Vicente Zambada Niebla's legal team is launching the bombshell contention as part of an effort to convince a U.S. judge that charges should be dropped. They claim agents allegedly told Zambada he could keep breaking the law, and be immune from prosecution, in return for tips on rival cartels....
Sunday, June 05, 2011
Citizen-Shot Video Shows Cops Lied About Citizen-Shot Video
... Father James Manship released video footage Thursday that contradicts an East Haven police report justifying his arrest.
Manship was arrested on Feb. 19 on misdemeanor charges while videotaping police officers in My Country Store, an East Haven business run by Ecuadorian immigrants. Manship pleaded not guilty to the charges, claiming that he was recording an incident of police harassment, part of an alleged campaign of systematic intimidation and racial profiling perpetrated by East Haven police against Latinos. Manship’s attorneys recently secured the footage from the East Haven Police Department, which confiscated his video camera at the time of the arrest . . .
The footage appears to contradict a claim made by the East Haven police department in a police report that was withheld until 13 days after the incident. The police report, David Cari, one of two arresting officers, states that he didn’t know what the New Haven priest was holding. He wrote that he saw an “unknown shiny silver object” that Manship had “cupped” in his hands, and was afraid for his safety. Read the police report here . . .
The police report alleges that Father Manship concealed the fact that he was videotaping the officers, by cupping his hands over “a silver object.”
“Not knowing if Manship was holding a camera or a possible weapon this officer asked Manship to show me what was in his hands,” Cari’s report reads.
In direct contradiction of Cari’s claim, the video from Manship’s camera shows Officer Cari twice verbally identifying the “silver object” as a camera.
“Sir what are you doing? Is there a reason that you have a camera on me?” says Officer Cari, in the video.
“I’m taking a video of what’s going on here,” Manship replies.
“Well, I’ll tell you what, what I’m going to do with that camera,” Officer Cari says, as he walks around a shelving unit to approach the priest.
Father Manship’s responses to the officers were calm and non-threatening, Fernandez-Chavero argued as he showed the footage....
Marijuana “Field Test” Nabs Sage-Burning Birdwatcher
We can now add sage to the list of substances that have turned out false positives on the field tests cops use when they think they’ve found marijuana. The list also includes chocolate chip cookies; deoderant; billiards chalk; Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soap; patchouli, spearmint, and eucalyptus; and breath mints.
Why, it’s almost as if these field tests say whatever the cops want them to say. They’re like the drug-detecting dogs of . . . um . . . drug detection. Okay. So that metaphor doesn’t work....
... Father James Manship released video footage Thursday that contradicts an East Haven police report justifying his arrest.
Manship was arrested on Feb. 19 on misdemeanor charges while videotaping police officers in My Country Store, an East Haven business run by Ecuadorian immigrants. Manship pleaded not guilty to the charges, claiming that he was recording an incident of police harassment, part of an alleged campaign of systematic intimidation and racial profiling perpetrated by East Haven police against Latinos. Manship’s attorneys recently secured the footage from the East Haven Police Department, which confiscated his video camera at the time of the arrest . . .
The footage appears to contradict a claim made by the East Haven police department in a police report that was withheld until 13 days after the incident. The police report, David Cari, one of two arresting officers, states that he didn’t know what the New Haven priest was holding. He wrote that he saw an “unknown shiny silver object” that Manship had “cupped” in his hands, and was afraid for his safety. Read the police report here . . .
The police report alleges that Father Manship concealed the fact that he was videotaping the officers, by cupping his hands over “a silver object.”
“Not knowing if Manship was holding a camera or a possible weapon this officer asked Manship to show me what was in his hands,” Cari’s report reads.
In direct contradiction of Cari’s claim, the video from Manship’s camera shows Officer Cari twice verbally identifying the “silver object” as a camera.
“Sir what are you doing? Is there a reason that you have a camera on me?” says Officer Cari, in the video.
“I’m taking a video of what’s going on here,” Manship replies.
“Well, I’ll tell you what, what I’m going to do with that camera,” Officer Cari says, as he walks around a shelving unit to approach the priest.
Father Manship’s responses to the officers were calm and non-threatening, Fernandez-Chavero argued as he showed the footage....
Marijuana “Field Test” Nabs Sage-Burning Birdwatcher
We can now add sage to the list of substances that have turned out false positives on the field tests cops use when they think they’ve found marijuana. The list also includes chocolate chip cookies; deoderant; billiards chalk; Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soap; patchouli, spearmint, and eucalyptus; and breath mints.
Why, it’s almost as if these field tests say whatever the cops want them to say. They’re like the drug-detecting dogs of . . . um . . . drug detection. Okay. So that metaphor doesn’t work....
Sunday, May 29, 2011
This Is Your War on Drugs
We have another video of a raid by the Columbia Police Department. The action starts at 5:30. There’s more violence. More perfunctory dog killing. (I didn’t hear a single menacing growl, and the dogs were shot while retreating.) There’s more careless tossing of flash grenades. (They threw five, then, bizarrely, two more “to prove that the previous 5 grenades had done no damage.”) This raid, once again, was for marijuana.
I’ve become somewhat inoculated to the outrage in many these stories. I think you probably need to in order to write about this stuff every day. But I was shaking while watching this one. Then I let out a string of profanities. Then I gave my dog a hug.
All of which is why you need to watch it. And help distribute it as far and wide as the Columbia raid video from last year. This isn’t like watching video of a car accident or a natural disaster. This doesn’t have to happen. You’re watching something your government does to your fellow citizens about 150 times per day in this country. ...
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