Man claiming to be terrorist leads police on high speed chase  

A West Virginia man claiming he was Osama Bin Laden led police on a high speed chase before he ultimately crashed into other vehicles, police said.

The terrorist act of choice for Tena Bergeno, 26, of Charleston, W.Va., was threatening by drink blender, according to reports. Bergeno brandished a blender at police on Coastal Highway near 37th Street at the end of a high speed car chase today at around 10 a.m., police said.

The story started Monday when Bergeno claimed he was Osama Bin Laden to a police officer, which the officer responded to by having him evaluated at Atlantic General Hospital. Bergeno was eventually released, according to reports.

Police said Bergeno was acting strangely at 9:45 a.m. Wednesday morning, and he jumped into a car at First Street and sped off when police tried to stop him.

Bergeno ran a red light at Second Street, almost hitting two cars, then plowed through three cars at a red light at 36th Street before his car became disabled and police surrounded him, according to reports.

After disarming Bergeno of his blender, the suspect was charged with fleeing and eluding, hit and run, second-degree assault and minor traffic charges, police said.

Bergeno is currently at Peninsula Regional Medical Center undergoing psychiatric evaluation, police said.

The Daily Times - www.delmarvanow.com - Salisbury, Md.

posted by Matthew LeFande 7:48 AM
matt@lefande.com

Pa. officer accused in bra theft scheme  

A Philadelphia police officer had two girls shoplift for her and then lied about her name and occupation when the group was apprehended, prosecutors charged.

Renell Cohen, 35, picked out bras that were later stolen by the girls when they left a Wal-Mart at the Franklin Mills Mall, authorities said.

Security cameras were trained on the group during the July store visit after an assistant manager thought Cohen was acting suspiciously.

Cohen, a four year veteran of the police department, was fired Tuesday, the same day theft, corruption of minors and other charges were upheld against her at a preliminary hearing in Family Court.

The girls told authorities they were between 14 and 16.

"The facts of this case are really troubling," Assistant District Attorney Janet Turnbull said.

The girls stole merchandise worth $259.52, while Cohn went on to purchase goods worth about $87.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/B/BRA_THEFT?SITE=MTBIL&SECTION=STRANGE&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

posted by Matthew LeFande 7:41 AM
matt@lefande.com

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Legislators seek review of border agents' conviction  

Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill have asked for congressional hearings and reviews by the White House and Justice Department into the conviction of two U.S. Border Patrol agents who shot and wounded a fleeing drug suspect.

The agents, convicted by a federal jury in El Paso in March, face 20 years in prison at a sentencing hearing next month.

"It appears the facts do not add up or justify the length of the sentences for these agents, let alone their conviction on multiple counts," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, California Democrat. "Border Patrol agents have a difficult and often dangerous job in guarding our nation's borders.

"Undue prosecution of Border Patrol agents could have a chilling effect on their ability to carry out their duties," Mrs. Feinstein said in a letter Monday to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, Pennsylvania Republican, requesting a full hearing into the matter.

She asked Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales last week to investigate the case. The U.S. attorney's office in El Paso, which reports to the Justice Department, prosecuted the two agents.

In a letter to President Bush, Rep. Walter B. Jones, North Carolina Republican, asked the White House to review the case, saying the prosecution was "outrageous." He said it did nothing but "tie the hands of the Border Patrol and prevent the agency from securing America against a flood of illegal immigrants, drugs, counterfeit goods and, quite possibly, terrorists."

"This demoralizing prosecution puts the rights of illegal smugglers ahead of our homeland security and undermines the critical mission of better enforcing immigration laws," Mr. Jones said. "These two agents should not be made scapegoats for our government's enforcement failures."

A federal jury convicted agents Ignacio Ramos, 37, and Jose Alonso Compean, 28, in March of causing serious bodily injury, assault with a deadly weapon, discharge of a firearm in relation to a crime of violence, and a civil rights violation. The shooting occurred Feb. 17, 2005, near Fabens, Texas, about 30 miles southeast of El Paso.

Osbaldo Aldrete-Davila, a Mexican national, was wounded as he ran from the agents along the Rio Grande after they said he pointed what appeared to be a gun at them as they tried to apprehend him. Nearly 800 pounds of marijuana, worth $1 million, was found in the van that he abandoned at the river's edge, the Border Patrol said.

Mr. Aldrete-Davila, who was given immunity by prosecutors to testify against the agents, also received care at William Beaumont Army Medical Center in El Paso. He is suing the government for $5 million for violating his civil rights.

"The circumstances do not justify the verdict, and these convictions are already having an adverse impact on the Border Patrol," Mrs. Feinstein said.

Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner Jr., Wisconsin Republican and chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, called for a congressional investigation and open hearings on the case during an immigration field hearing in El Paso. The committee's investigation is expected to begin before the end of the year.

Rep. John Hostettler, Indiana Republican and chairman of the House Judiciary subcommittee on immigration, border security and claims, who attended the El Paso hearing, said that if the arrest, trial and conviction of the two Border Patrol agents had resulted in a chilling effect on others, "then it's definitely something we should know about."

Spotted in his van near the Rio Grande, records show that Ramos gave chase while Compean circled around to head off the suspect. When Mr. Aldrete-Davila jumped out of the van and ran south to the river, he was confronted by Compean, who was thrown to the ground as the two men fought. Ramos said that when he arrived, he saw Compean on the ground and chased Mr. Aldrete-Davila to the river, where the suspect suddenly turned toward him, pointing what looked like a gun.

Ramos said he fired at the fleeing suspect but did not think he had been hit after watching him run through the bush, jump into an awaiting van in Mexico and speed off.

An investigator from the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General tracked down Mr. Aldrete-Davila in Mexico, where he was offered immunity in exchange for testimony. The department oversees the Border Patrol.

A U.S. probation officer has recommended in a report to the court that the agents be sentenced to 20 years.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20060823-122228-3575r.htm

posted by Matthew LeFande 7:40 AM
matt@lefande.com

Tuesday, August 22, 2006

Errant e-mail puts Sheriff's Dept. secrets in media's lap  

Apparently the Pima County Sheriff's Department hasn't heard the saying that loose lips sink ships.

A "law-enforcement-sensitive" information alert on terrorist activity stamped repeatedly "Do NOT release to the public or media" was sent out Monday to pretty much every media organization in Southern Arizona.

In a Keystone Kops-style maneuver, Lt. Karl Woolridge, in the Special Operations Section of the Sheriff's Department, sent an e-mail to members of the media instead of to its intended recipients.
Sheriff's Capt. Oscar Miranda, commander of the support operations division, said Woolridge simply pushed the wrong button and sent the message to the wrong e-mail group.

Instead of an internal e-mail list, "he sent it to the DUI task force, which includes the media." That list is intended to make the media aware of events such as checkpoints and special enforcements to catch drivers under the influence, he said.

It contains advice for officers such as the fact that suspicious activity involving weapons, ammunition, dangerous chemicals and flight manuals could be a tip-off about terrorist activity.

Miranda said it's standard for alerts by the intelligence unit to be stamped with "Law-enforcement-sensitive" and "Do NOT release to the public or media."

The e-mail wasn't too damaging because a specific threat was not identified, he said, adding, "We should be doing everything on this list already."

Still, he said, "it hurts me that it shouldn't have gone out."

So what of Woolridge, who mistakenly sent out the alert?

"We're going to slap him silly, yes," Miranda said.
He said that meant the top brass would have a serious talk with Woolridge about who is an appropriate recipient of sensitive e-mail and who is not.

http://www.azstarnet.com/dailystar/dailystar/143114

posted by Matthew LeFande 2:01 PM
matt@lefande.com

Monday, August 21, 2006

Armed citizen of the week  

A customer carrying a gun foiled a man who attempted to rob a Indianapolis fast-food restaurant with a screwdriver in his pocket, police said.

William McMiller Jr., 40, was being held at the Marion County jail Friday on an $80,000 bond for an initial charge of robbery.

He demanded money and threatened to shoot a cashier at the Kentucky Fried Chicken on the city's west side Thursday afternoon, according to Indianapolis police.

McMiller ordered a bucket of chicken then told the cashier, "Give me the money before I shoot you," police said.

He held his hand in his back pocket as if reaching for a gun, police said, then began to climb over the counter.

Paul Sherlock, a customer sitting in the dining room, approached and pulled out his 9 mm handgun.

He held McMiller at gunpoint until police arrived. Officers found a long screwdriver, but no gun, in McMiller's pocket.

Sherlock had a valid gun permit, police said.

http://www.boston.com/news/odd/articles/2006/08/18/would_be_robber_with_screwdriver_foiled/

posted by Matthew LeFande 9:42 AM
matt@lefande.com

Thursday, August 17, 2006

Mass murder in the skies: was the plot feasible?  

Binary liquid explosives are a sexy staple of Hollywood thrillers. It would be tedious to enumerate the movie terrorists who've employed relatively harmless liquids that, when mixed, immediately rain destruction upon an innocent populace, like the seven angels of God's wrath pouring out their bowls full of pestilence and pain.

The funny thing about these movies is, we never learn just which two chemicals can be handled safely when separate, yet instantly blow us all to kingdom come when combined. Nevertheless, we maintain a great eagerness to believe in these substances, chiefly because action movies wouldn't be as much fun if we didn't.

Now we have news of the recent, supposedly real-world, terrorist plot to destroy commercial airplanes by smuggling onboard the benign precursors to a deadly explosive, and mixing up a batch of liquid death in the lavatories. So, we have got to ask, were these guys for real, or have they, and the counterterrorist officials supposedly protecting us, been watching too many action movies?

We're told that the suspects were planning to use TATP, or triacetone triperoxide, a high explosive that supposedly can be made from common household chemicals unlikely to be caught by airport screeners. A little hair dye, drain cleaner, and paint thinner - all easily concealed in drinks bottles - and the forces of evil have effectively smuggled a deadly bomb onboard your plane.

Or at least that's what we're hearing, and loudly, through the mainstream media and its legions of so-called "terrorism experts." But what do these experts know about chemistry? Less than they know about lobbying for Homeland Security pork, which is what most of them do for a living. But they've seen the same movies that you and I have seen, and so the myth of binary liquid explosives dies hard.

Making a quantity of TATP sufficient to bring down an airplane is not quite as simple as ducking into the toilet and mixing two harmless liquids together.

First, you've got to get adequately concentrated hydrogen peroxide. This is hard to come by, so a large quantity of the three per cent solution sold in pharmacies might have to be concentrated by boiling off the water. Only this is risky, and can lead to mission failure by means of burning down your makeshift lab before a single infidel has been harmed.

But let's assume that you can obtain it in the required concentration, or cook it from a dilute solution without ruining your operation. Fine. The remaining ingredients, acetone and sulfuric acid, are far easier to obtain, and we can assume that you've got them on hand.

Now for the fun part. Take your hydrogen peroxide, acetone, and sulfuric acid, measure them very carefully, and put them into drinks bottles for convenient smuggling onto a plane. It's all right to mix the peroxide and acetone in one container, so long as it remains cool. Don't forget to bring several frozen gel-packs (preferably in a Styrofoam chiller deceptively marked "perishable foods"), a thermometer, a large beaker, a stirring rod, and a medicine dropper. You're going to need them.

It's best to fly first class and order Champagne. The bucket full of ice water, which the airline ought to supply, might possibly be adequate - especially if you have those cold gel-packs handy to supplement the ice, and the Styrofoam chiller handy for insulation - to get you through the cookery without starting a fire in the lavvie.

Once the plane is over the ocean, very discreetly bring all of your gear into the toilet. You might need to make several trips to avoid drawing attention. Once your kit is in place, put a beaker containing the peroxide / acetone mixture into the ice water bath (Champagne bucket), and start adding the acid, drop by drop, while stirring constantly. Watch the reaction temperature carefully. The mixture will heat, and if it gets too hot, you'll end up with a weak explosive. In fact, if it gets really hot, you'll get a premature explosion possibly sufficient to kill you, but probably no one else.

After a few hours - assuming, by some miracle, that the fumes haven't overcome you or alerted passengers or the flight crew to your activities - you'll have a quantity of TATP with which to carry out your mission. Now all you need to do is dry it for an hour or two.

The genius of this scheme is that TATP is relatively easy to detonate. But you must make enough of it to crash the plane, and you must make it with care to assure potency. One needs quality stuff to commit "mass murder on an unimaginable scale," as Deputy Police Commissioner Paul Stephenson put it. While it's true that a slapdash concoction will explode, it's unlikely to do more than blow out a few windows. At best, an infidel or two might be killed by the blast, and one or two others by flying debris as the cabin suddenly depressurizes, but that's about all you're likely to manage under the most favorable conditions possible.

We believe this because a peer-reviewed 2004 study in the Journal of the American Chemical Society (JACS) entitled "Decomposition of Triacetone Triperoxide is an Entropic Explosion" tells us that the explosive force of TATP comes from the sudden decomposition of a solid into gasses. There's no rapid oxidizing of fuel, as there is with many other explosives: rather, the substance changes state suddenly through an entropic process, and quickly releases a respectable amount of energy when it does. (Thus the lack of ingredients typically associated with explosives makes TATP, a white crystalline powder resembling sugar, difficult to detect with conventional bomb sniffing gear.)

By now you'll be asking why these jihadist wannabes didn't conspire simply to bring TATP onto planes, colored with a bit of vegetable dye, and disguised as, say, a powdered fruit-flavored drink. The reason is that they would be afraid of failing: TATP is notoriously sensitive and unstable. Mainstream journalists like to tell us that terrorists like to call it "the mother of Satan." (Whether this reputation is deserved, or is a consequence of homebrewing by unqualified hacks, remains open to debate.)

It's been claimed that the 7/7 bombers used it, but this has not been positively confirmed. Some sources claim that they used C-4, and others that they used RDX. Nevertheless, the belief that they used TATP has stuck with the media, although going about in a crowded city at rush hour with an unstable homebrew explosive in a backpack is not the brightest of all possible moves. It's surprising that none of the attackers enjoyed an unscheduled launch into Paradise.

So, assuming that the homebrew variety of TATP is highly sensitive and unstable - or at least that our inept jihadists would believe that - to avoid getting blown up in the taxi on the way to the airport, one might, if one were educated in terror tactics primarily by hollywood movies, prefer simply to dump the precursors into an airplane toilet bowl and let the mother of Satan work her magic. Indeed, the mixture will heat rapidly as TATP begins to form, and it will soon explode. But this won't happen with much force, because little TATP will have formed by the time the explosion occurs.

We asked University of Rhode Island Chemistry Professor Jimmie C. Oxley, who has actual, practical experience with TATP, if this is a reasonable assumption, and she tolds us that merely dumping the precursors together would create "a violent reaction," but not a detonation.

To release the energy needed to bring down a plane (far more difficult to do than many imagine, as Aloha Airlines Flight 243 neatly illustrates), it's necessary to synthesize a good amount of TATP with care.

So the fabled binary liquid explosive - that is, the sudden mixing of hydrogen peroxide and acetone with sulfuric acid to create a plane-killing explosion, is out of the question. Meanwhile, making TATP ahead of time carries a risk that the mission will fail due to premature detonation, although it is the only plausible approach.

Certainly, if we can imagine a group of jihadists smuggling the necessary chemicals and equipment on board, and cooking up TATP in the lavatory, then we've passed from the realm of action blockbusters to that of situation comedy.

It should be small comfort that the security establishments of the UK and the USA - and the "terrorism experts" who inform them and wheedle billions of dollars out of them for bomb puffers and face recognition gizmos and remote gait analyzers and similar hi-tech phrenology gear - have bought the Hollywood binary liquid explosive myth, and have even acted upon it.

We've given extraordinary credit to a collection of jihadist wannabes with an exceptionally poor grasp of the mechanics of attacking a plane, whose only hope of success would have been a pure accident. They would have had to succeed in spite of their own ignorance and incompetence, and in spite of being under police surveillance for a year.

But the Hollywood myth of binary liquid explosives now moves governments and drives public policy. We have reacted to a movie plot. Liquids are now banned in aircraft cabins (while crystalline white powders would be banned instead, if anyone in charge were serious about security). Nearly everything must now go into the hold, where adequate amounts of explosives can easily be detonated from the cabin with cell phones, which are generally not banned.

The al-Qaeda franchise will pour forth its bowl of pestilence and death. We know this because we've watched it countless times on TV and in the movies, just as our officials have done. Based on their behavior, it's reasonable to suspect that everything John Reid and Michael Chertoff know about counterterrorism, they learned watching the likes of Bruce Willis, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Vin Diesel, and The Rock (whose palpable homoerotic appeal it would be discourteous to emphasize).

It's a pity that our security rests in the hands of government officials who understand as little about terrorism as the Florida clowns who needed their informant to suggest attack scenarios, as the 21/7 London bombers who injured no one, as lunatic "shoe bomber" Richard Reid, as the Forest Gate nerve gas attackers who had no nerve gas, as the British nitwits who tried to acquire "red mercury," and as the recent binary liquid bomb attackers who had no binary liquid bombs.

For some real terror, picture twenty guys who understand op-sec, who are patient, realistic, clever, and willing to die, and who know what can be accomplished with a modest stash of dimethylmercury.

You won't hear about those fellows until it's too late. Our official protectors and deciders trumpet the fools they catch because they haven't got a handle on the people we should really be afraid of. They make policy based on foibles and follies, and Hollywood plots.

Meanwhile, the real thing draws ever closer.

http://www.theregister.com/2006/08/17/flying_toilet_terror_labs/

posted by Matthew LeFande 8:26 AM
matt@lefande.com

Mom drove car as 15-year-old son shot man  

A 15-year-old's mother was driving the car from which the boy fired the shots that killed a mentally disabled man, police said.

The woman slowed the car as she drove past the house Wednesday afternoon and her son shot Jermaine Martin, 27, with an SKS semiautomatic rifle, police said. Martin was shot in the back and collapsed face down on his lawn.

Investigators did not immediately give a motive for the shooting or release the identities of those arrested.

Police officers found the car described by witnesses a short time after the shooting and the woman, her son and 16-year-old boy who was also in the car were arrested at the scene. City police detectives continued several hours after the shooting to question witnesses and the three people arrested, the Post-Tribune of Merrillville reported.

A neighbor said Martin, known as "Bobo," rarely strayed far from his front yard and was generous with neighborhood children.

"Bobo never hurt anyone in his life. When the ice cream truck came, he bought for everyone," Crystal Boykin said.

Martin was often harassed by others, she said.

"We've called police about him, I don't know how many times, because the guys were always trying to rob him," Boykin said. "The police never came."

http://www.whas11.com/sharedcontent/APStories/stories/D8JHV8980.html

posted by Matthew LeFande 8:17 AM
matt@lefande.com

Protects like armor, fits like Armani  

"Who here hasn't been shot?"

Miguel Caballero is walking around his company's showroom in Bogotá, Colombia, holding a .38-caliber revolver. "You!" he says, pointing to German Gonzalez, a 20-something salesman who's been on the job for just two weeks. "You're next."

Gonzalez wiggles nervously into an $850 brown suede winter jacket and zips it up to the collar. A foot or so away, the smiling Caballero lowers the weapon and takes aim.

"One!" Gonzalez takes a deep breath and stares up at the ceiling. "Two!..." A deafening blast sends Gonzalez lurching backward - and then screaming out in relief, clutching at the hole in the jacket where the bullet has come to a safe stop.

No, this isn't some cruel corporate hazing ritual. For Caballero, founder and CEO of the company that carries his name, this is just a showman's way of demonstrating his products.

Caballero sells a line of armored clothing that fits like Armani but deflects point-blank gunfire like the Popemobile. Last year the 38-year-old entrepreneur sold an estimated $7 million worth of bulletproof trench coats, business suits, suede jackets, and denim casuals to executives, political leaders, undercover agents, and other VIPs - people who demand more than a bodyguard for protection and don't like the bulk or SWAT-team look of flak jackets and vests.

"There are hundreds of companies that make bulletproof vests," Caballero says. "We make bulletproof fashion."

Behind the style, though, is some groundbreaking substance. Instead of heavier Kevlar materials for armored lining, Caballero developed and patented a weave of nylon and polyester that can stand up to gunfire without sacrificing convenience or comfort.

The first Kevlar-based bulletproof leather jacket he created weighed 11 pounds. Today the same garment, with the new material, is just 2.6 pounds - about the heft of something you might try on at Nordstrom

That's helped attract A-list customers, including Presidents Alvaro Uribe of Colombia and Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, who each own a bulletproof guayabera, a thin cotton shirt common in the Caribbean.

"It's not just about bulletproofing with style anymore," Caballero says. "Bulletproof clothing is becoming a style."

In fact, the company held its first runway show in Guadalajara in January, featuring Mexican models sporting a new line of casual wear. Afterward, Caballero's Mexican office sold in four weeks what it had projected to sell for the year.

And in August, Caballero will open a high-end boutique in one of Mexico City's most exclusive shopping districts. The store's neighbors? Armani, Cartier, Louis Vuitton, and Tiffany.

That kind of cachet goes a long way. Exports jumped nearly sevenfold from 2004 to 2005 and now account for 80 percent of sales.

Perhaps the most enviable sign of global success: the debut of knockoffs. The CEO says he's spotted counterfeit Caballero jackets for sale in Venezuela and the Netherlands.

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/business2/business2_archive/2006/08/01/8382235/index.htm

posted by Matthew LeFande 8:15 AM
matt@lefande.com

Sunday, August 13, 2006

Cameras fail to focus on street crime  

Surveillance cameras like those authorized by the D.C. Council for police investigations and now being put in place have shown limited success in decreasing violent crime in other cities.

Baltimore, for example, set up about 80 cameras in May 2005 in high-crime neighborhoods. Volunteers and retired law-enforcement personnel monitor the images in real time, but the cameras have not helped put criminals behind bars.

"Generally, the State's Attorney's Office has not found them to be a useful tool to prosecutors," office spokeswoman Margaret Burns said. "They're good for circumstantial evidence, but it definitely isn't evidence we find useful to convict somebody of a crime."

Ms Burns said Baltimore prosecutors kept detailed statistics from the first nine months of the camera program. Most of the 500 cases forwarded to prosecutors were quality-of-life crimes, she said, and 40 percent of those cases were dropped by prosecutors or dismissed by the courts.

"We have not used any footage to resolve a violent-crime case," she said.

Ms Burns said police sometimes misidentify suspects because the cameras produce "grainy" and "blurry" images.

"We have had that happen more than once," she said.

The D.C. Council, faced with a sharp increase in crime, passed emergency legislation July 19 that allows the Metropolitan Police Department to use surveillance cameras in neighborhoods as part of an emergency plan.

D.C. workers on Thursday began installing the first four of an expected 47 cameras throughout the city. Officials said the four cameras are temporary and will be replaced by permanent ones later this month. About 24 cameras will be deployed by the end of August, and 23 more will be added in September, police said.

Police Chief Charles H. Ramsey is required to notify only two persons about plans to place a camera in any given neighborhood: an advisory neighborhood commissioner and the appropriate council member. The cameras will operate 24 hours a day, but police will review the images only when a known crime may have been recorded.

Chicago deployed a few dozen cameras in neighborhoods in July 2003. Authorities there captured their first drug transaction 19 months later, in February 2005.

Police arrested three suspects and confiscated 12 packets of heroin. However, the cameras have not helped in criminal investigations.

"From my perspective, I would love it if we had footage of the murderer leaving the house, but that hasn't happened yet," said Kevin Smith, a spokesman for Chicago's Office of Emergency Management and Communications, which administers and monitors the 170-camera network.

Police in San Francisco said a camera paid off in an investigation for the first time in June, when they arrested a man in connection with a shooting in April.

Nine months after the first cameras were installed in neighborhoods, a camera captured the image of a man getting out of a car. The man subsequently shot at another man and missed, injuring a 13-year-old girl. The image was not recorded, but police said the camera was key to the investigation.

Surveillance cameras also have generated headlines for the wrong reasons.

In April 2005, a San Francisco police officer was suspended from the department for using surveillance cameras to ogle women at San Francisco International Airport.

New York officials say surveillance cameras in public-housing projects have led to substantial decreases in crime.

Written policies and random audits help guard the system against abuse, but that proved ineffective when the tape of a 22-year-old man who fatally shot himself in the lobby of a housing project in March 2004 surfaced on a pornographic Web site.

Critics argue that cameras only push criminals into unobserved areas. A University of Cincinnati study in 2000 concluded that surveillance cameras have a short-term deterrent effect, which likely would increase when the public is notified about their presence.

Cameras in Baltimore, Chicago, New York and San Francisco are labeled as police property. No police department logos are affixed to the D.C. cameras that were in place before the recently crime emergency.

D.C. police spokesman Kevin Morison said police are required to post signs indicating that an area is under surveillance. He could not say whether such notification would be required under a clause dealing with "exigent" circumstances.

Mr. Morison said several neighborhood leaders have requested cameras.

Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the District-based Electronic Privacy Information Center, said he has heard neighborhood leaders express approval of the cameras at hearings but is not sure whether most residents share that support.

"It's very difficult to get a clear read on whether this is something that residents really want," Mr. Rotenberg said. "I don't think people understand that if you put these cameras in residential communities, you're talking about a telescopic lens that can zoom in and a 360-degree casing that can look into your bedroom."

http://www.washingtontimes.com/metro/20060813-121827-2123r.htm

posted by Matthew LeFande 9:55 AM
matt@lefande.com

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

US Marines rate CPI training "Outstanding"  

The US Marines have rated CPI's training "Outstanding" after CPI's Foreign Weapons Familarization Course at Quantico on August 8, 2006.

"...4th CAG has found CPI to be outstanding. They had every weapon we will be fighting against in numbers and the instructors were very knowledgable in every system. They were very flexible with us during our workup planning and went above and beyond many times."

"Every Marine trained commented on how motivating the training was."

"The instructors were very professional and understood our need for thourough training in this subject..."

The evaluation is here:
http://www.commonwealthprotection.org/MarineCAGFAMevaluation.pdf

Some photos from the training are here:
http://www.commonwealthprotection.org/CPIFAM.htm

posted by Matthew LeFande 1:08 PM
matt@lefande.com

Monday, August 07, 2006

Doctored Reuters Photo of Beirut and the Manipulation of the Media  

“We are in a battle, and that more than half of this battle is taking place in the battlefield of the media. And that we are in a media battle in a race for the hearts and minds of our Ummah.” - Ayman al-Zawahiri, in a letter to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi

Ayman al-Zawahiri's words do not only apply to his al-Qaeda and affiliated groups, but to all terrorist organizations. Terrorists do not employ terror tactics because of their military strength, but because of their military weaknesses; they have no hope of defeating modern militaries on the conventional battlefield. They seek to strike at the strategic weakness of democratic states: public opinion. They seek to erode the public's will to fight terror groups. Terrorist organizations skillfully manipulate the media to propagate their message. And in some instances, the terrorists have willing accomplices within the media. The current war between Israel and Hezbollah provides examples of both media manipulation and accommodation.

Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs provides a visual tutorial of how a Reuters photograph of Beirut is manipulated via PhotoShop. A scene of Beirut is altered, quite crudely, to include smoke plumes where none exist, to magnify Israeli air strikes in the city. Remarkably, as a result of Mr. Johnson and a host of blog's investigations, Reuters has admitted the photograph has been tampered with and will no longer retain the services of Adnan Hajj, the photographer, who admitted to altering the photo (he claims he was trying to remove dust from the image). "As soon as the allegation came to light, the photograph, filed on Saturday 5 August, was removed from the file and a replacement, showing the same scene, was sent. The explanation for the removal was the improper use of photo-editing software," said Moira Whittle, Reuters' head of public relations. That such an obvious fake passed Reuters' editorial staff is disturbing. And there may be more faked photos out there by Adnan Hajj.

The doctored photo is Adnan Hajj's second brush with the blogs this week. Richard North of EU Referendum provides a look at how Hezbollah manipulated the media in the aftermath of the Israeli air strike in the Lebanese town of Qana. This incident was covered by the Jerusalem Post. Initially, 56 civilians were reported killed in Qana, but the number has been revised downward to 28. Mr. North looks at the images from Qana, and identifies what appears to be two Hezbollah operatives posing for the cameras as they shuttle selected child casualties and parade them by the penned up camera crew. One operative is actually photographed in his home, which is filled with photographs of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, and has been identified in recovery work in the city of Tyre, again carrying corpses from the bomb scene. Adnan Hajj was one of the photographers at Qana. Reuters denies the photographs at Qana were staged.

Hezbollah also is notorious for providing 'guided tours' of scenes within Beirut. Charlie Moore, a CNN Senior Producer for Anderson Cooper, explains how Hezbollah staged such a tour for the CNN crew, which included a staged ambulance response and canned death to Israel and America chants. Yet there was very little discussion of this and other incidents other than at the CNN and on a weekend talk show. There are no exposes on how Hezbollah manipulates the press.

Hezbollah's propaganda machine and Al Manar, Hezbollah's "media" outlet, receive little to no criticism in the press. In fact, Israeli attempts to shut down Al Manar have been criticized by the International Federation of Journalists, which views Al Manar as a valid news organization, despite the fact the United States has designated it a terrorist entity.

http://counterterrorismblog.org/2006/08/doctored_reuters_photo_of_beir.php

posted by Matthew LeFande 8:14 AM
matt@lefande.com

Saturday, August 05, 2006

Speeder stops to help trooper chasing him  

A Montana state Highway Patrol officer who crashed while trying to catch up to a speeding motorist got some aid from an unlikely source — the man he was chasing.

The patrolman, Frank Nowakowski, was uninjured in the crash Wednesday.

Nowakowski was nearing the end of his shift along Interstate 15 when a vehicle sped by at more than 95 mph in the opposite lanes.

Nowakowski crossed the median and took off after the driver, reaching speeds of 120 mph in an effort to catch up. Nowakowski said he had just decided to end the pursuit for safety reasons when one of the rear tires of his cruiser blew out, sending his patrol car careering off the highway and through a barbed-wire fence.

“This happened in a heartbeat,” he said. “I had no idea.”

Moments later, the man he had been trying to stop, whom the patrol identified only as a Bozeman man, was at his side at the crash scene.

Trooper David Braggs said the driver apparently was unaware that Nowakowski was trying to pull him over, but saw a large cloud of dust in his rearview mirror, knew there had been an accident and turned around to help.

The man, who later confessed to being late for an appointment, agreed to give officers a statement, and if nothing else, had the opportunity to apologize.

“It was very heartfelt,” said Nowakowski. “He felt bad because there could have been some lousy consequences.”

Capt. Butch Huseby of the Highway Patrol called it “amazing” and “fortunate” the trooper’s car didn’t roll.

No citations had been issued as of Thursday.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14191850/from/RS.4/

posted by Matthew LeFande 10:03 PM
matt@lefande.com

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