Website and automated forms processes, Copyright
2007, Matthew August LeFande.
All
rights reserved. No claim to original government forms
Website and automated forms processes, Copyright
2007, Matthew August LeFande.
All
rights reserved. No claim to original government forms
Armed Citizen of the Week
Bob Adams says he was wearing a blue bathrobe and in fear of being attacked last week when he shot an intruder inside his Davis Square home.
The intruder, 37-year-old ex-con Stephen P. Callinan of 127 North St., has a history of arrests and convictions for construction scams and break-ins. He was formally arrested by Somerville Police on charges of breaking and entering and malicious destruction of property Sunday after being released from the hospital for his gunshot wound.
The shooting occurred last Thursday at about 12:44 p.m., when Adams said he had gone to his 27 Winter St. home for a mid-day shower to prepare for an afternoon meeting in Boston. While he was in the shower, Adams said he heard someone banging loudly on his front door, so he wrapped himself in a pink towel, looked out his second-floor window and saw a man at his front door.
The man, later learned to be Callinan, began walking around the house, Adams said, and then he started hearing a crashing sound at his back door. Adams said he put on his robe, grabbed his cell phone to call police and his short-barrel .38 caliber pistol that he keeps around for protection.
"I grabbed my pistol and I'm coming down the stairs and he bashes the back door open," Adams said. "He makes a stance like he's going to charge me and I'm like 'what the f-, he's about 6 feet 3 inches tall."
Adams said he thought Callinan was trying to grab a knife he had left sitting out on a cutting board in his kitchen by the back door.
"It looked to me that he was reaching for a knife," Adams said last Friday standing at the foot of his stairs inside his home at the same spot where he had shot Callinan the day before.
"I'm in my freaking blue bathrobe and bare feet," Adams "I didn't aim it or anything ... I swung my arm up and BOOM. And when he saw my arm come up, he squirmed."
Adams said Callinan then bolted out of the house and ran down Winter Street.
"I shot at him and I didn't think I hit him cause he ran like a f------ deer," Adams said.
http://www.townonline.com/somerville/news/local_regional/sj_covsjshooterms01292004.htm
posted by Matthew LeFande 11:25 AM
matt@lefande.com
Washington Post reports identified armed killer is at large, does nothing to help find him.
Above are two photographs of David Wright, believed by police to be the triggerman in the triple homicide at Colonel Brooks' Tavern last year. The Washington Post reports he is at large, the police are looking for him and he is considered "armed and extremely dangerous."
Is it really too much to ask that the Washington Post posts his picture on its website and maybe do something to help catch him?
Anyone with information about the whereabouts of David Wright, please call 202-727-9099.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58232-2004Jan28.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 9:04 AM
matt@lefande.com
Two senators want matches, lighters banned from plane cabins
Two senators said on Tuesday that the Transportation Security Administration should reconsider its policy of allowing butane lighters and matches in the cabins of passenger airliners.
Democratic Sens. Ron Wyden of Oregon and Byron Dorgan of North Dakota said they're concerned that terrorists could use a disposable lighter or a match to ignite improvised explosives, such as jackets or pillows that have been chemically treated.
The senators sent a letter last fall asking the TSA to review the decision it made in February to allow passengers to carry two butane lighters and four books of matches onto planes.
On Dec. 2, then-TSA chief James Loy responded in a letter, saying, ''Allowing two small lighters and four books of matches for personal use has been determined to be an acceptable level of risk in the balance of protection and customer service.''
Wyden said Loy's response indicated a lax attitude toward security.
''Richard Reid was one good flare-up away from blowing a hole in the side of a jet and taking 200 people with him,'' said Wyden, referring to the convicted terrorist who tried to light a bomb in his shoe on a trans-Atlantic flight in December 2002. It was the smell of sulfur that alerted a flight attendant to Reid's attempt.
''The FBI said the belief is if he had a lighter instead of a match, it would have detonated,'' Dorgan said.
http://famulus.msnbc.com/famulusgen/ap01-27-140525.asp?t=apnew&vts=12720041414
posted by Matthew LeFande 8:28 AM
matt@lefande.com
Airports' gun ban under fire by group
A Virginia gun advocacy group is battling the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority over a regulation banning guns on its property - including sections of the heavily traveled Dulles Access Road, routes 28 and 606, and the Reagan National Airport Metrorail station.
The Virginia Citizens Defense League claims MWAA is overstepping state and federal laws to purposely conceal the "obscure and unknown" ban, essentially "trapping" law-abiding gun owners who travel across authority property.
The authority, which operates Dulles International and Reagan National airports, says it is not bound by "the more general" state laws and that the ban is necessary to maintain airport security.
"We believe we do have under our authority the right to have such a ban, even though Virginia has legislation that would prohibit other airports in the state from having such a ban," said Edward Faggen, general counsel for MWAA. "We're sort of a stand-alone authority with the powers given us by [Virginia and the District of Columbia]."
The authority was created in 1987 as an interstate compact, approved by Congress, between Virginia and the District. Whether the authority is bound by Virginia laws appears to be a matter of interpretation.
A Virginia state law, which went into effect in July, and a consequent Attorney General's opinion, gives gun owners with a concealed weapons permit - or otherwise transporting a gun legally - the universal right to possess the weapon except in a few specific places, including courthouses, places of worship and schools.
The law was meant to wipe out a growing patchwork of local gun regulations that would put gun owners at risk of violating obscure laws as they traveled around the state.
The MWAA regulation states no person can bring a weapon onto authority property unless the weapon is unloaded and "deactivated to the extent possible" and immediately checked as baggage or promptly given to the U.S. Postal Service or legitimate freight company for shipment.
No exceptions are made for permit holders or people who otherwise are transporting a gun legally, so even if they are miles away from the airport terminal, they will be arrested, MWAA associate general counsel Naomi Klaus said in an Sept. 2, 2003, e-mail to a VCDL member.
VCDL President Philip Van Cleave said MWAA's claims of legal sovereignty are outrageous.
"Can they have their own military? Will they print their own money?," Van Cleave asked. "The federal government, Virginia and D.C. laws all say the Virginia law is supreme at the airports."
http://www.jrnl.com/cfdocs/new/ffx/mainstory.cfm?snumber=03&paper=ffx§ion=fp
posted by Matthew LeFande 12:36 PM
matt@lefande.com
Eat Well and Design
I don't always have an explaination for the links I post. Sometimes, it's because I'm not sure what they are.
http://www.fistsofcurry.com/
posted by Matthew LeFande 10:24 PM
matt@lefande.com
Armed Citizen of the Week
An Adelphi man fatally shot a would-be burglar who was trying to break into his house yesterday, Prince George's County police said.
The 9 a.m. shooting marked the second time in five months that a Prince George's resident fatally shot someone during an attempted crime. The Adelphi man was not identified by police because the incident is under investigation and because he has not been charged, officials said. Police and neighbors said the man is in his sixties and lives alone. As of early last night, police had not identified the man who was killed. They said he appeared to be in his early twenties.
The state's attorney's office will review the case after police complete their investigation, authorities said.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A33845-2004Jan21.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 8:18 AM
matt@lefande.com
Support Teresa Chambers
The website is dedicated to publishing the facts concerning the suspension of US Park Police Chief Chambers from full duty and the attempt by the National Park Service to not only fire Chief Chambers, but to dishonor her integrity. The links provide the facts of the case, action items that interested parties may take to support Chief Chambers and help call for her reinstatement, links to news articles about Chief Chambers, and how to contact Chief Chambers and send her words of encouragement and support.
http://www.honestchief.com/
posted by Matthew LeFande 8:46 AM
matt@lefande.com
Nine reasons why we never sent our Special Operations Forces after al Qaeda before 9/11.
Since 9/11, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has repeatedly declared that the United States is in a new kind of war, one requiring new military forces to hunt down and capture or kill terrorists. In fact, for some years, the Department of Defense has gone to the trouble of selecting and training an array of Special Operations Forces, whose forte is precisely this. One president after another has invested resources to hone lethal "special mission units" for offensive--that is, preemptive--counterterrorism strikes, with the result that these units are the best of their kind in the world. While their activities are highly classified, two of them--the Army's Delta Force and the Navy's SEAL Team 6--have become the stuff of novels and movies.
Prior to 9/11, these units were never used even once to hunt down terrorists who had taken American lives. Putting the units to their intended use proved impossible--even after al Qaeda bombed the World Trade Center in 1993, bombed two American embassies in East Africa in 1998, and nearly sank the USS Cole in Yemen in 2000. As a result of these and other attacks, operations were planned to capture or kill the ultimate perpetrators, Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants, but each time the missions were blocked. A plethora of self-imposed constraints--I call them showstoppers--kept the counterterrorism units on the shelf.
As terrorist attacks escalated in the 1990s, White House rhetoric intensified. President Clinton met each successive outrage with a vow to punish the perpetrators. After the Cole bombing in 2000, for example, he pledged to "find out who is responsible and hold them accountable." And to prove he was serious, he issued an increasingly tough series of Presidential Decision Directives. The United States would "deter and preempt...individuals who perpetrate or plan to perpetrate such acts," said Directive 39, in June 1995. Offensive measures would be used against foreign terrorists posing a threat to America, said Directive 62, in May 1998. Joint Staff contingency plans were revised to provide for offensive and preemptive options. And after al Qaeda's bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, President Clinton signed a secret "finding" authorizing lethal covert operations against bin Laden.
Several plans have been identified in newspaper accounts since 9/11. For example, "snatch operations" in Afghanistan were planned to seize bin Laden and his senior lieutenants. After the 1998 embassy bombings, options for killing bin Laden were entertained, including a gunship assault on his compound in Afghanistan.
SOF assaults on al Qaeda's Afghan training camps were also planned. An official very close to Clinton said that the president believed the image of American commandos jumping out of helicopters and killing terrorists would send a strong message. He "saw these camps as conveyor belts pushing radical Islamists through," the official said, "that either went into the war against the Northern Alliance or became sleeper cells in Germany, Spain, Britain, Italy, and here. We wanted to close these camps down. We had to make it unattractive to go to these camps. And blowing them up, by God, would make them unattractive."
And preemptive strikes against al Qaeda cells outside Afghanistan were planned, in North Africa and the Arabian Gulf. Then in May 1999, the White House decided to press the Taliban to end its support of bin Laden. The Counterterrorism and Security Group recommended supporting the Northern Alliance.
These examples, among others, depict an increasingly aggressive, lethal, and preemptive counterterrorist policy. But not one of these operations--all authorized by President Clinton--was ever executed. General Schoomaker's explanation is devastating. "The presidential directives that were issued," he said, "and the subsequent findings and authorities, in my view, were done to check off boxes. The president signed things that everybody involved knew full well were never going to happen. You're checking off boxes, and have all this activity going on, but the fact is that there's very low probability of it ever coming to fruition. . . ."
http://weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/003/613twavk.asp?pg=1
posted by Matthew LeFande 1:19 PM
matt@lefande.com
Videotape Shows U.S. Helicopter Crew Firing on Suspected Iraqi Insurgents
The video opens with the helicopter tracking a man in a pickup truck north of Baghdad on Dec. 1, one day after the 4th Infantry Division engaged in the bloodiest battles with Iraqi insurgents since the end of major combat.
The pilots watch as the man pulls over and gets out to talk to another man waiting by a larger truck.
"Uh, big truck over here," one of the pilots is heard saying. "He's having a little powwow."
The pickup driver looks around, then reaches into his vehicle, takes out a tube-shaped object that appears to be about 4 or 5 feet long, and runs away from the road into a field. He drops the object in the field and heads back to the trucks.
"I got a guy running throwing a weapon," one of the pilots says. Retired Gen. Jack Keane, an ABCNEWS consultant who viewed the tape, said the object looked like a rocket-propelled grenade launcher, "or something larger than a rifle."
The pilots check in with their operational commander, who is monitoring the situation. When they tell him they are sure the man was carrying a weapon, he tells them: "Engage. Smoke him."
http://more.abcnews.go.com/sections/wnt/US/apache_video_040109.html
Quicktime Video
http://www.journalism.co.uk/imagesn/apache.mpeg
posted by Matthew LeFande 3:34 PM
matt@lefande.com
Officer's Conviction Overturned in Anthrax Prank
A federal appeals court yesterday overturned the conviction of a U.S. Capitol Police officer who pulled a practical joke about anthrax during the 2001 poison scare in Washington, perhaps clearing the way for the veteran officer to return to the force.
In dismissing the case, the three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit said that James J. Pickett, 38, never should have been indicted or convicted of making false statements.
"This is not only a complete vindication of Officer Pickett, but a clear message from the Court of Appeals . . . that the government had no business bringing this prosecution," said Eli Gottesdiener, Pickett's attorney. "We expect this will lead to his immediate reinstatement."
The appellate court panel ruled yesterday that in matters involving the legislative branch, criminal charges about false statements must concern statements made within an ongoing investigation. Since there was no investigation into the material as possible anthrax, Pickett broke no law, the court said.
"The evidence is so far from overwhelming that it would have been difficult for Pickett to find it in order to controvert it," declared Judge David B. Sentelle, writing for the court.
Gottesdiener said that Pickett was "ecstatic . . . . He's been waiting tables and taking classes to be a real estate agent. He wants to get back to work."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/metro/?nav=left
posted by Matthew LeFande 9:50 AM
matt@lefande.com
Gun Rights Aren't for District, Judge Rules
The constitutional right to bear arms doesn't apply to the District of Columbia's residents, a federal judge ruled yesterday in rejecting the claim of several city residents who contended that a 1976 city law banning the possession of guns left them unfairly vulnerable.
U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton said he dismissed the lawsuit, led by taxicab commissioner and activist Sandra Seegars, after determining that the District was a "uniquely designed governmental entity" and that the founders were not considering the city when they wrote the Constitution's Second Amendment allowing state militias to take up arms against the federal government.
Walton found that all but one of the District residents suing the city and the federal government did not have a legitimate reason to file a federal suit about their constitutional rights because they didn't own a gun nor had they tried to register one. For the one resident who did own a shotgun, Gardine Hailes, the judge ruled that a history of court decisions led him to conclude that the Second Amendment doesn't apply to the city that is the home of the federal government.
The decision spurred an angry response from some who said it put D.C. residents in a second-class category with fewer rights.
"The judge unfortunately has selectively looked at only part of the Second Amendment's history and ignored cases in which all of the rest of the Bill of Rights have been applied to the District of Columbia," said Richard Gardiner, attorney for the residents. "Citizens of the District are as much citizens of this country as anyone else."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A18785-2004Jan15.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 9:27 AM
matt@lefande.com
Park police chief alleges systematic harassment
Park Police Chief Teresa Chambers was harassed for at least a year as she tried to reform her agency, and was eventually put on administrative leave after she filed a formal complaint against her immediate supervisor, her attorneys said Wednesday.
Lawyers for the embattled chief said she and her top deputies faced an increasingly hostile work environment during the past year that included the scattering of nails under the tires of their vehicles, placement of used condoms on and around vehicles, computer hacking, and the pepper-spraying of office doors.
On Dec. 2, 2003, Chambers filed a written complaint against her immediate supervisor, Park Service Deputy Director Donald Murphy. Three hours after the complaint was filed, Murphy placed a gag order on Chambers preventing her from talking publicly about problems in her agency, said Jeff Ruch, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, which has joined a legal team seeking Chambers' reinstatement. Murphy followed the gag order days later by placing Chambers on administrative leave and requesting that she be officially terminated.
Murphy disciplined Chambers after she told the media the Park Police faced serious budget and personnel shortfalls. Specifically, Murphy has charged Chambers with improper budget communications, making public remarks regarding security on federal property, improper disclosure of budget deliberations, improper lobbying, failure to carry out a supervisor's instructions, and failure to follow the chain of command.
Chambers issued a point-by-point rebuttal to the charges this week. Ruch said the charges against Chambers are illegal and appear to be in retaliation for the complaint she filed against Murphy.
http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0104/011404c1.htm
posted by Matthew LeFande 9:16 AM
matt@lefande.com
Which America Hating Minority Are You?
In these ever turbulant, modern times, the world has found itself uniting under common ideals. Though the almost viral spread of democracy has delivered a better way of life to many, it has also carried with it the twisted influence of a nation that was into democracy before it was cool. The United States of America.
Today, there isn't a single country on Earth that doesn't feel the pull of it's red, white and blue puppet-strings as it lashes out at it's unseen foes. The new policy of the "besieged" empire, "kill people before they kill us", is not wholly considered a bad thing, but a portion, if not a lot, of the world, believe the arrogant young nation exists far beyond where it is welcome.
Of these dissidents and whingers who oppose the US, several generalised categories form. We reckon we can pick you out one of 'em.
http://robertandtim.topcities.com/quiz/minority/minorityquiz.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 1:17 PM
matt@lefande.com
Officers feel the sting for themselves
Plattsmouth Police Officer Kristie Harris was the first of a dozen officers to take her turn being zapped by 50,000 electrical volts coming from a weapon firing darts.
Harris' jolt Tuesday afternoon lasted for a second. Two officers held Harris tightly so she didn't fall on the mat.
"It felt like my leg was on fire," Harris said afterward. "It's pretty freaky."
The experiment helped Plattsmouth officers understand the effects of their latest weapon, said Officer Jon Hardy.
Plattsmouth is one of the first Nebraska departments to deploy the newest model of the Taser gun - the X26. Several departments have used an older version, and the Omaha Police Department is considering buying Tasers.
Plattsmouth police officers took their turns Tuesday feeling the darts' sharp sting.
http://www.omaha.com/index.php?u_np=0&u_pg=1636&u_sid=974090
Quicktime movie
http://www.wkrk.com/images/dd/MVC-003V.MPG
posted by Matthew LeFande 1:13 PM
matt@lefande.com
The HoMeBoY NyTe SyTeS TM
posted by Matthew LeFande 4:08 PM
matt@lefande.com
Advocate seeks repeal of in-restaurant ban
A Virginia gun lobbyist is seeking the repeal of a law that forbids a person with a concealed-carry permit from carrying a gun into a restaurant.
"A person with a permit to carry a concealed weapon should be able to walk into a Red Lobster," said Philip Van Cleave, president of the Virginia Citizens Defense League, a gun-rights group. "You don't want to leave your gun in the car for it to be stolen."
The law allows a person with a permit to openly carry a weapon, but it bans everyone from carrying a concealed weapon into a restaurant that serves alcohol, even someone with a concealed-carry permit.
Mr. Van Cleave's group wants the law to allow people with a permit to carry a concealed weapon as long as they don't drink. If people want to drink wine with their meal, they would have to carry the gun openly, Mr. Van Cleave said.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/metro/20040111-112625-3731r.htm
posted by Matthew LeFande 10:10 AM
matt@lefande.com
Bomb Vest and Briefcase Bomb Training Devices
Here are a number of photos released by Israeli Anti-Terrorist personnel at the Worldwide Conference in Charleston, South Carolina. All photos depict the real stuff being used against Israel and through out the mid-east by terrorists.
These pictures are very interesting in that the explosives can be easily concealed. Also notice the nails and hardware added to the explosive devices and the cell phone in the brief case. Pictures of bombs currently being used by suicide bombers in Israel.
http://www.sftt.org/article12092002b.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 9:53 AM
matt@lefande.com
13-year-old drunken driver surprises Minnesota troopers
Even in a profession where few days can be considered routine, a state trooper's discovery of a drunken 13-year-old trying to drive away a crumpled vehicle was a rarity.
The girl had an alcohol-concentration level of slightly more than 0.20 when she was arrested early Christmas morning, said State Patrol Capt. Jay Swanson.
That is more than twice the legal limit - for drivers 21 and over.
"We do arrest teens for drunken driving," Swanson said. "But usually they're 16 or 17. In 24 1/2 years of doing this, I can't remember a case when a 13-year-old was arrested for DWI."
Authorities don't yet know where the girl got the alcohol or how she gained access to the car, Swanson said. No alcohol was found in the car.
State trooper Beth Stanton saw a car stalled on northbound Interstate Hwy. 35W near 50th Street in Minneapolis about 3:30 a.m. Dec. 25.
She first noticed a girl curled up on the ground near the center median crying.
When Stanton went to the car, she found another girl in the driver's seat trying to put the car into gear, Swanson said.
Stanton reached into the car, took the keys and pulled the girl from the car.
The teenage driver was taken to the Juvenile Detention Center, but she was so unruly that officials there asked that she be taken to Hennepin County Medical Center.
http://www.sacbee.com/24hour/weird/story/1110029p-7745405c.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 1:44 PM
matt@lefande.com
Ohio Legislature passes CCW bill
Lawmakers passed a bill Wednesday to allow Ohioans to carry concealed guns, and Gov. Bob Taft said he will sign it.
Those who apply for the permits would have to pay a fee, undergo background checks and be trained in the use of a weapon.
The Senate vote was 25-8, and the House vote was 69-24.
http://www.cleveland.com/newsflash/national/index.ssf?/base/national-16/107353464259371.xml
posted by Matthew LeFande 4:40 AM
matt@lefande.com
Bill would forbid illegals to bear arms
A Virginia lawmaker is drafting a bill that would prohibit illegal immigrants from carrying a gun, a move that toughens a law that he says allows potential terrorists and drug dealers to roam free.
Delegate Thomas C. Wright Jr., Victoria Republican, said current law allows illegal aliens to carry any guns except assault weapons. He said his bill will give police new authority when trying to crack down on terrorism and drug trafficking.
"If it's only used one time, it's worthwhile," Mr. Wright said.
"I'm not approaching this from a gun-control standpoint. If someone is in this country illegally, there is no basis for granting them rights to a firearm."
http://www.washingtontimes.com/metro/20040106-101057-1008r.htm
posted by Matthew LeFande 1:16 PM
matt@lefande.com
Officer Retires, but Tales of His Heroics Endure
He has rushed into burning buildings to save those trapped inside and once jumped from a helicopter into the Potomac River to rescue a drowning man. He has been shot at nearly a dozen times and has suffered a broken ankle, a concussion and other injuries in 33 years on the D.C. police force. His many acts of bravery have made him one of the most decorated officers in the department's history.
But Steven O'Dell said his most recent feat -- retirement -- has been particularly difficult.
"It's the hardest thing I've ever done," said O'Dell, 52, who retired Dec. 27 from the D.C. police department.
O'Dell's departure marks the end of a distinctive, often dramatic career, the highlights of which serve as reminders of both the danger and the lifesaving impact of day-to-day police work. Over the years, as he rose through the ranks to sergeant and eventually lieutenant, gaining experience as a hostage negotiator, counter-sniper and auto-theft fighter, O'Dell had a propensity for seeking out and stumbling into harm's way.
Through the decades, O'Dell has been awarded one gold, one silver and four bronze medals for service and valor -- a rare accomplishment.
O'Dell is already looking into starting a local or national police reserve program. It would make retired police and emergency personnel available in the event of emergencies.
"It's an honorable profession," said O'Dell, as he sat next to a wall of framed awards. "You have the ability to have a profound impact on people in a positive way. . . . This is what we do, and we try to do our best."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53340-2004Jan4.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 2:34 PM
matt@lefande.com
Armed Citizen of the Week
Two home invasion suspects were in custody and another was hospitalized Friday morning following a shooting during their attempted invasion.
The three robbers broke into a woman's house on North Roys Avenue, but police said the woman got a gun and fired at them. A robber who was hit showed up several blocks away on North Wheatland Avenue with injuries.
He was taken to a local hospital.
http://www.nbc4columbus.com/news/2737277/detail.html
posted by Matthew LeFande 5:05 AM
matt@lefande.com
