The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday that a North Carolina town’s policy that allegedly banned video live-streaming police during traffic stops was in violation of the First Amendment. The ruling stated that Dijon Sharpe was live-streaming his traffic stop on Facebook Live when police officer Myers Helms attempted to take his phone away because he said live-streaming threatened his safety. Sharpe then sued the Winterville police officers in their official capacity for having a policy that violates the First Amendment and also sued Helms individually. The district court did not find that the policy violated the First Amendment and dismissed the individual complaint against Helms under qualified immunity, according to the ruling. The appeals court vacated the district court’s order, ruling that if such policy exists that bans video live-streaming, it does violate the First Amendment. The ruling said that live-streaming police encounters provides information the same way recording police officers does.
“Recording police encounters creates information that contributes to discussion about governmental affairs,” the ruling said. “So too does livestreaming disseminate that information, often creating its own record. We thus hold that livestreaming a police traffic stop is speech protected by the First Amendment.” The court ruled that Sharpe’s claim can proceed, but that he must now prove that the alleged policy banning live-streaming exists in Winterville. If he can prove it, the town will then have a chance to prove it does not violate the First Amendment, the ruling reads. The appeals court did hold up the district court’s ruling that dismissed the individual complaint against Helms, and said that Helms is protected under qualified immunity, which is a rule that protects police officers from being held individually liable unless the officer clearly violates a constitutional right. Sharpe argued that it was “clearly established” that Helms violated his First Amendment rights, but the court disagreed and said the officer was “entitled” to qualified immunity. “On the other hand, although Officer Helms was allegedly acting under the policy that plausibly violates the First Amendment, Sharpe’s claim against him in his personal capacity fails,” the ruling reads. “It was not clearly established that Officer Helms’s actions violated Sharpe’s First Amendment rights and so he is protected by qualified immunity.”
February is designated Black History month in the United States. As we commemorate Africa’s rich history throughout the Americas, let us not forget that many of the things we use today and take for granted were created by black inventors. As we document some of those inventions, let us remind ourselves that many more were created by our ancestors but were misappropriated and plain old stolen and credited to others.
We cannot claim the future unless we reconnect with the past, with who we are, not what some would tell us we are. There are those occupying high political office who would sooner erase African-American contributions from our minds, from American history books. They have banned and burned books, removed African studies courses, and maligned the teaching of African-American studies in colleges and high schools. One such degenerate even said African-American history has no educational value.
Unfortunately for that dunce, the United States has no history of its own except, of course, Native-American history. All other aspects of American history have been borrowed from other parts of the world, with a tremendous amount of it borrowed and stolen from Africa. Currently, far too many black folks in the United States writ large are still lacking in self-awareness, choosing instead to be invested in entertainment and lasciviousness. Your enemy will define you if you do not know who you are.
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Mike Beckles is a former Police Detective, businessman, freelance writer, black achiever honoree, and creator of the blog mikebeckles.com.
When police violate the rights of citizens in the United States, the citizen is forced to report the abuse at the station house to which the offending officers are attached, or not at all. In most cases, as reported by individuals and groups who have tested this process, the person reporting abuse by police is treated with disdain, threats, and intimidatory tactics. In other cases, people are lied to and even arrested on trumped-up charges as they try to make a complaint. In cases where there is a civilian complaint review board, it is almost pointless reporting to them; as you will see with the review board in New York City, it is toothless and totally useless. Officers get to decide whether or not they want to attend interviews relating to their misconduct, regardless of the seriousness of the allegations against them. And even in cases where the allegations are thoroughly investigated and are substantiated, the Review Board can only pass on the findings to the department for action. The Review Board has no way of knowing whether the department acted on the findings. This is what passes for police accountability in the United States. Police departments and their rogue elements are unaccountable and above the law.(mb)
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A newly released report from the city agency that investigates complaints of police misconduct criticizes the NYPD for failing to properly track where officers were deployed during the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests. It also says the department did not request enough support from emergency medical professionals, and did not equip officers with riot gear that made it easy for them to be identified.
The police watchdog agency, the Civilian Complaint Review Board, published the nearly 600-page document Monday. It details its review of hundreds of complaints against officers who responded to the protests in 2020 after Minneapolis police killed George Floyd.
The agency received a barrage of officer complaints following city-wide demonstrations between May and November of that year. Investigators weren’t able to conduct a full review of many of those complaints. Of the cases the agency did review fully, it found that at least 146 members of service who responded to the protests violated department rules. Officers broke NYPD policy in about 40% of the cases it was able to fully investigate, the report says.
In more than a quarter of full investigations, the agency couldn’t identify the officer at the center of the complaint, making it impossible to recommend discipline. Overall, the police department, which has the final say on discipline, has only imposed discipline against 42 officers so far. Dozens of cases are still pending.
Among the incidents detailed: On Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn, two police cruisers drove through a crowd of protesters. In Lower Manhattan, officers allegedly hit people with batons so hard that they caused bone fractures. Police spewed pepper spray indiscriminately into a crowd outside the Barclays Center. They surrounded demonstrators in Mott Haven, arrested them and allegedly zip tied some protesters’ hands so tightly that they went numb. One sergeant pushed a photojournalist to the ground, causing scrapes to his arms, legs and cheeks and $800 in damage to his camera.
In a statement, a spokesperson for the NYPD noted that the number of officers who faced a substantiated complaint represents less than 1% of the of 22,000 members of service who responded to the protests. “This confirms that the NYPD response to the protests during the summer of 2020 was largely professional, commendable, and responsive to the unique circumstances that were present at the time,” the statement said. In a letter to CCRB leadership, NYPD Acting Deputy Commissioner of Legal Matters Carrie Talanksy accused the CCRB of basing its findings on “limited information” and failed to acknowledge that officers were working in “hostile and adversarial conditions.” She noted that more than 400 officers were injured and about 250 were hospitalized. She said the oversight agency “artificially inflates the data presented to the NYPD’s detriment,” and said the department has already taken action in some of the cases outlined in the report and has implemented recommendations from the Department of Investigation.
The watchdog agency had planned to share its findings in mid-2022, but the publication date was repeatedly delayed as the agency struggled to keep up with an unprecedented number of complaints against officers who were often unnamed.
A cascade of external roadblocks and internal failures stalled investigations into those complaints. Officers declined to participate in virtual interviews at the height of the pandemic, requests for body camera footage turned up irrelevant videos and illegible personnel rosters made it nearly impossible to identify the swath of officers who were deployed outside of their normal precincts during the days of protests across the city. Many officers covered their shield numbers to hide their identities from protesters who might later file a complaint.
A Gothamist investigation found that many CCRB employees had been sounding the alarms for months, urging the agency to speak up earlier about the challenges it was facing. Staff told Gothamist that the agency also failed to team up investigators in a way that would have made it easier for them to share evidence and collaborate.
A staffing shortage in the CCRB unit that handles the most serious cases has also created a backlog for administrative trials against officers who have been charged with policy violations. More than 60 of those cases are unresolved.
Other groups have already documented widespread issues with the NYPD’s response to the 2020 demonstrations. A Department of Investigation report found police used “excessive tactics” and a Human Rights Watch report called the police response to a protest in Mott Haven “intentional, planned, and unjustified.”
The CCRB report zeroes in on individual allegations against officers, the outcomes of the agency’s investigations and the punishments that officers did — or didn’t — face.
“Protests against police brutality bred more instances of police misconduct,” CCRB Chair Arva Rice wrote in the report. “If this misconduct goes unaddressed, it will never be reformed.”
The report highlights some of the agency’s most common findings against officers, including that many officers violated NYPD guidelines when they struck civilians with batons, improperly used pepper spray against peaceful protesters and used excessive physical force to push and shove people. Multiple officers also failed to provide medical care to people with injuries, didn’t turn on their body cameras during some interactions that should have been recorded, or placed bands on their shields to hide their numbers and refused to tell people their names.
Here are some other key takeaways:
Case outcomes:
The CCRB received more than 750 complaints, 321 of which fell within the CCRB’s jurisdiction. (The CCRB is only allowed to investigate a few types of misconduct: force, abuse of authority, discourtesy and offensive language. The agency also launched a new unit to investigate claims of racial profiling and bias-based policing last year.)
The agency was able to fully investigate 226 of those complaints.
The CCRB determined that officers had violated policy in 88complaints.
Investigators were unable to determine the suspected officer’s identity in 59 complaints.
The agency was unable to determine if misconduct had occurred in 50 complaints.
Officers were found to have followed NYPD guidelines in just 18 of the 321 complaints.
The agency found that the alleged misconduct did not occur in 11 cases
The CCRB substantiated 269 allegations of misconduct against 146members of service (Sometimes complaints include multiple different allegations of wrongdoing. The agency also notes that it counted officers more than once in this tally if they had multiple complaints with substantiated misconduct.)
The substantiated allegations include: 140 claims of excessive force, 72 claims of abuse of authority, 24 claims of untruthful statements, 24 claims of discourtesy and 9 claims of offensive language.
The NYPD has finalized 78 cases and has imposed discipline in 42of them.
Main obstacles during investigations:
Officers took “pervasive and purposeful actions” to hide their identities, including putting bands over their shields and refusing to provide their names and shield numbers to civilians.
The NYPD provided delayed and inconsistent responses to requests for body camera and other video footage.
Officers refused to be interviewed virtually for several months when COVID restrictions prevented the CCRB from holding in-person interviews.
Remote work and other COVID restrictions caused work delays.
The CCRB outlined more than a dozen recommendations for the police department, to improve its response to protests and make it easier for the agency to investigate complaints in the future. The NYPD is not required to follow them.
Those recommendations include:
All officers should go through updated training on crowd control tactics.
Officers’ names and shield numbers should be clearly visible during protests.
Police should not take action against people who are complying with orders.
The department should do a better job of tracking vehicle assignments, supervisor assignments and which officers respond to their fellow officers’ calls for help during protests.
Body cameras should be turned on whenever officers are interacting with civilians, including when officers are in distress and call for help.
The CCRB should have direct access to body camera footage.
The NYPD should set up medical treatment areas staffed with EMTs who can quickly treat injured people who are arrested, before they are taken to be processed.
Officers should provide a voucher whenever they seize property so that it can be returned to the owner.
The CCRB’s long-anticipated report brings some sense of resolution for the scores of New Yorkers who were pepper sprayed, pushed, beaten with batons and cursed at during the 2020 protests. But, nearly three years later, about 60 of the most severe allegations are still pending. Multiple civil lawsuits filed against the police department are also ongoing, including one filed by Attorney General Letitia James.
The City Council is considering a bill that would ban the NYPD’s infamous Strategic Response Group from responding to nonviolent protests. The Department of Investigation found that the unit provoked protesters, instead of de-escalating tense encounters. The Council’s public safety committee was supposed to hold an oversight hearing to question the unit about its budget and tactics in December, but that hearing has been postponed twice and is now rescheduled for March.(Reported by the Gothamist)
Just when you think, ok, there is no way that police can do worse than what we have already seen.
Last year on Sept. 1, as Butte County was in the midst of 100-plus-degree heat wave, Dana Marie James found herself arrested for trespassing after taking a dip in a Chico homeowner’s pool.
James was arrested by a deputy from the Butte County Sheriff’s Office who “observed that Ms. James was incoherent, had an altered mental status and was possibly under the influence of a controlled substance,” according to a lawsuit against another agency, the Oroville Police Department, filed in federal court Monday.
She was taken to jail in Oroville, with her shoes left behind, booked and then cited and released just before 3 p.m.
“Ms. James displayed obvious signs and symptoms of mental and physical impairment at the time of her release from the jail and this is recorded on jail video,” the suit filed by Rocklin attorney Robert Chalfant says. “Ms. James was not given a bus pass so that she could return to her home in Chico, California, or provided shoes.
“Ms. James was simply thrown out onto the streets of the city of Oroville.”
Then, according to the civil rights lawsuit, the 52-year-old woman’s real troubles began, culminating with her being abandoned in the middle of the night in a remote area where she ended up being struck by a hit-and-run driver. Chalfant says James suffered life-altering injuries from the collision.
Acting Oroville Police Chief Bill LaGrone, reached on his cellphone Monday, declined to comment on the lawsuit, citing pending litigation.
But the suit accuses the police of a “state created danger,” deliberate indifference, negligence and other claims stemming from what James’ lawyer describes as Oroville’s failure to properly train its officers.
Woman wasn’t medically cleared to return to jail
Six hours after James was first released, around 9 p.m., she was arrested again, this time at a Home Depot by Oroville police Officer Robert Sasek, the suit says.
“During her arrest at the Home Depot, Ms. James was incoherent and unable to care for herself,” the suit says. “Ms. James was acting irrationally, had significant mental impairment including illogical and disorganized thoughts, and Officer Sasek believed that she was under the influence of a controlled substance.”
Sasek took her to jail, but the intake nurse there would not allow her to be booked until she received medical clearance, the suit said.
That’s when Sasek drove James to Oroville Hospital, where he had her wait in his patrol car while he went inside, the suit says. He returned and then released her in the parking before leaving. He was called back to the hospital when a hospital security guard called Sasek on his personal cellphone, the suit says.
“The security guard informed Officer Sasek that Ms. James had been walking around the exterior of the hospital trying to open locked doors,” the suit says. “The security guard further informed Officer Sasek that Ms. James was ‘out of control’ and had ‘barricaded’ herself in a hospital bathroom.”
By the time Sasek arrived, the security guard had James back out in the parking lot, and Sasek was joined by Oroville police Sgt. Ali Khan, the suit says. Sasek then drove to a gas station with James, where he met Khan and an unnamed officer, and “the three officers discussed a plan of action,” the suit says.
“All three officers knew and discussed that Ms. James had been rejected by the jail at booking because she had an urgent medical condition requiring evaluation and treatment and needed to be ‘medically cleared’ prior to being accepted into custody at the jail,” the suit says.
‘Abandon’ at the dump, cop sped off
The unnamed officer then suggested they “take her out to a remote area on Neal Road at the Waste Facility and abandon Ms. James at the dump,” according to the suit.
“Sergeant Ali Khan agreed with the plan and did not object or instruct his subordinates to cease their unlawful and improper conduct even though he knew that plaintiff’s rights were being violated and had the opportunity to intervene,” the suit says, adding that Khan “had an affirmative duty to stop the unlawful conduct of his subordinates but failed to do so.”
Sasek then drove 15½ miles north of town to the Neal Road Recycling and Waste Facility, the suit says.
“While being transported towards Chico, Ms. James asked, ‘Where are we going?’ and Officer Sasek responded, ‘Don’t worry about it’ and told her to ‘just shut up,’” the suit says.
At midnight, Sasek dropped James off in complete darkness, the suit says, and when she asked where they were he responded, “You will figure it out, it’s not my problem.”
“Ms. James pleaded with Officer Sasek to ‘take me home,’ prior to Officer Sasek getting back into his patrol vehicle and flooring the gas pedal, which threw dirt and gravel directly at Ms. James,” the suit says. “Ms. James was now all alone on Neal Road. It was dark out and there were no streetlights.
“Ms. James had no phone, no water, no shoes, no flashlight and no idea where she was. Officer Sasek just drove away discarding her on Neal Road outside of the dump at approximately midnight.”
The officers “treated Ms. James as though she was garbage,” the suit says. “Their heartless decision to abandon her at the dump would warrant criminal charges if they had abandoned a dog or cat.”
Hospitalized for 35 days after ordeal
After being left, James tried walking along the shoulder of the road back toward Oroville, the suit says, where “she was struck on her right side by a passing vehicle and was sent flying down an embankment into several large boulders where she remained in and out of consciousness and severely injured for approximately 10 hours.”
The vehicle that hit her didn’t stop, the suit says.
“At approximately 9:00 a.m. on September 2 (the next day), Ms. James summoned the strength to crawl up the embankment where she had remained in and out of consciousness all night and was seen by workers employed at the Franklin Construction yard,” the suit says. “They immediately recognized the seriousness of her injuries, provided water and assistance and called 911.”
“Butte County Sheriff’s Department officers arrived and insulted Ms. James by asking if her boyfriend had beaten her up,” the suit says. “The Butte County Sheriff’s Department failed to conduct any inquiry into how Ms. James had arrived at that location or who was responsible for hitting her with their vehicle.”
This time, James was taken to another hospital, Enloe Medical Center in Chico, where she spent seven days in intensive care and 35 total days in the hospital, the suit says.
She endured multiple surgeries, developed sepsis and suffered an infection on her right foot so deep she may lose those toes, the suit says.
“Based on the severe internal injuries that Ms. James sustained, medical providers were forced to remove 30 to 40 percent of her colon, and approximately two feet of her small intestine,” the suit says. “Ms. James has also been informed that due to the internal injuries and removal of a portion of her small intestine and a portion of her colon, she will likely be required to wear a colostomy bag for life.”
The suit also says that after Sasek left James at the dump, he “returned to his office the following day and completed his arrest report for his arrest of Ms. James at the Oroville Home Depot and submitted it to the Butte County District Attorney for prosecution.”(This story originated @Yahoonews)
NJ charges Patterson cop who shot wounded fleeing man in the back…
New Jersey’s top law enforcement official brought criminal charges Monday against a police officer he said shot a fleeing person in the back, wounding him severely.
Attorney General Matthew Platkin said the state filed charges of second-degree aggravated assault and official misconduct against Paterson Police Officer Jerry Moravek.
The charges stem from a June 2022 incident in which Moravek saw the victim, who is not identified in the charging documents, run past him soon after hearing gunshots. Moravek shouted for the person to drop the gun before firing, striking him in the back.
Platkin said the person did not have a gun in his possession or within reach. A firearm was found near the site of the shooting, according to the charging document, but Platkin said there was no DNA or fingerprint evidence linking it to the man.
“We have promised to never be complacent and we have made a commitment to stand up against unnecessary and excessive uses of force by those with a duty to protect the public,” Platkin said.
Moravek’s attorney, Patrick Caserta, said in a statement that his client had been falsely accused. He said the officer had a duty to pursue the person he thought had fired shots.
“During a short foot chase, there came a time when Officer Moravek believed his life and the life of other people in the street was at risk. He believed at that split-second that the person he was chasing was turning to fire that handgun at him and he realized that if he missed, the bullets could strike anyone nearby,” the statement read.
Moravek made repeated calls for an ambulance afterward, Caserta added.
Video released from the incident shows Moravek asking the person he shot why he ran from him.
“I was scared. I don’t have no gun, though” he said.
Platkin said the officer didn’t give the person he shot a warning that he was going to fire or order him to stop running or get down on the ground.
The shooting left bullet fragments in the person’s spine, Platkin said. He has not been able to walk since, according to the charging document.
Paterson Mayor Andre Sayegh said in a statement that a preliminary review found that Moravek followed guidelines while responding to a service call and after hearing gunshots fired. The mayor, a Democrat, cited the pending legal process and said he wouldn’t comment further.
The charges come as New Jersey has sought to increase scrutiny of police officers involved in shootings. In late 2020, Platkin’s predecessor issued new use-of-force rulesbarring physical force against civilians except as a last resort, among other requirements.
In 2019, New Jersey Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy signed a measure requiring the state attorney general to conduct investigations when police fatally shoot someone.
Platkin, a Murphy appointee, said Monday’s charges don’t stem from that law and presenting the case to a grand jury isn’t required, but his office “will not hesitate” to do so in cases like this one.
Paterson is a city of nearly 160,000 people about 20 miles (30 kilometers) west of Manhattan.
At a time when relations are strained to breaking between people of color and police, political leaders, including black elected officials, are marching forward as if all is kosher with massive police state expansions. They are oblivious to the calls from the citizens to stop throwing more and more of their hard-earned tax dollars on people who are wilfully murdering their loved ones… Massive infusions of cash into the coffers of political campaigns and good old fashion scared shitless to oppose the blue gang have caused even black Mayors to back spending more money on the police instead of opting for trained counselors and other professionals, not carrying a gun or Rambo-type folks who consider themselves hammers and everyone else nails. The Atlanta City Council in September 2021 approved a plan to build a facility dubbed police city in a 10 – 4 vote. Then-Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms supported the plan, calling the council vote “courageous” and rejecting the idea that we must “defund the police” as Black Lives Matter protesters have advocated. “What I’ve said repeatedly over the last year is that holding the men and women who serve us in a public safety capacity accountable is not mutually exclusive from supporting them,” Bottoms said, suggesting the only way to abolish police is to abolish crime.
Keisha Lance Bottoms
Lance Bottoms, who now works in the Biden Administration, takes the same tack from Joe Biden and other Democrats regarding defunding police, largely out of fear of Republican smear and the inability to critical-think. The idea that in 2023 we lack the imagination to envisage not sending poorly trained white racists with guns and the power to kill to deal with issues affecting black citizens is alarming. That we still consider the old slave patrol idea of policing and continue to build massive edifices to train and enhance that ignoble idealogy is astounding. There are better ways to deal with broken taillights and failure to use turn signals than armed robots with guns abusing and killing people just living their lives. Unless harassing, beating, and killing them is the point. Bottoms claimed the training facility would “help boost morale,retention and recruitment” of police officers and provide “21st-century training, rooted in respect and regard for the communities they serve.” The center would be among the largest in the country, more massive than LAPD or NYPD facilities. In other words, if taxpayers do not give police what they want and allow them to continue to operate as they have been, they will throw a hiss fit and refuse to do their jobs, and would-be applicants will look elsewhere for employment. If this is true, this is a marvelous idea and a spectacular way of getting the kinds of police officers the country needs. Maybe .…just maybe, what the country needs is to let the departments bleed out those power-crazed androids. In the end, fewer good cops are exponentially better than a ton of shitty cops.
DeKalb County CEO Michael Thurmond Democrat
The naïveté‘ of that statement would be laughable if it weren’t so utterly stupid. Does the American police need their morale boosted? Keisha Lance Bottoms’ statements reminded me of the trees who thought the Axe was their friend because the handle is made of wood. Or the Frog who ferried a scorpion on it’s back across the river with the assuracnce the scorpion wouldn’t sting him. Ultimately, an Axe may have a wooden handle, but only to chop down trees. A scorpion will assure a frog it won’t sting, but eventually it will, because that’s what scorpions do, … they sting. It is intellectually indolence to continue to heap more and more money on policing through the razing of much-needed forests as is being done to create a cop city in Atlanta instead of reimagining how we can secure our communities without the trauma that police continue to create.
Atlanta’s Andrea Dickens, Democrat and black.
Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens and DeKalb County CEO Michael Thurmond cleared the way for the 85-acre, $90 million complex on city-owned forest land near a predominately Black community. Huge surprise there. According to the Atlanta Police Foundation — the organization leasing the land and funding two-thirds of the facility with Atlanta taxpayers picking up the rest of the tab — the training center promises to “reimagine law enforcement training and Police/Fire Rescue community engagement.” Of course, yes, reimaging policing as the Frog imagined the scorpion wouldn’t stink, killing him midstream. We get it. Well, the people in Dekald county and its environs cannot blame ‘whitey’ for this one, at least on the face of it. This is the work of black co*&s; I mean, black leaders. Some also thought more black cops and black police chiefs would solve police violence so there is that as well. Naievely and unimiginatively failing to understand that it’s not just about color but a culture of impunity fostered by immunity. The naivety and intellectual laziness permeating the conversation on this subject are astounding. The idea that policing, a construct, cannot be reimagined because it is absolute and there is no replacement is beyond laughable. But then again, some people believe they must destroy what’s left of our fragile ecological system for coal mining to heat homes and businesses, even as other nations are making leaps and bounds in green energy. And to be fair, there is a massive police facility going up right here in my county of Dutchess New York, to the tune of.….… wait for it.…. As of June 30, 2021, $159.4 million has been spent or encumbered on all phases of the project, with a remaining $32.8 million approved and available to spend of the full $192.2 million appropriated. [The Justice and Transition Center’s (Jail) design has been downsized from its original 569-bed design to 328 beds in 2020. Funds approved and available in 2016 for this phase of the construction project are $154.8 million. The estimated cost to complete the revised jail plan is $131.4 million, with a projected cost savings of approximately $22.8 million. The current timeline for construction completion of the jail is May 2024.] As reported by MidHudsonNews.com) The massive, ever-increasingly dangerous police state is here to stay.
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Mike Beckles is a former Police Detective, businessman, freelance writer, black achiever honoree, and creator of the blog mikebeckles.com.
Many people who know Kevin McCarthy have long argued that the newly minted speaker of the US house of representatives is a cheap empty suit. Harsh? I have no way of knowing; I do not know the guy. But it darn sure seems like McCarthy will do anything to get whatever it is that he wants. Some see his embrace of Marjorie Green and Paul Gosar, two racist clowns in his conference, as a sign McCarthy will sell his soul as long as he can attain his political ambitions. It is hard to argue with after what we witnessed in the US House in an almost unprecedented fashion, as it took fifteen ballots for the Californian to be elected speaker and only after much horse trading and the use of loopholes. Audio Article below.
U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar (D‑Minn.) attends a press conference on committee assignments for the 118th U.S. Congress, at the U.S. Capitol Building on January 25, 2023, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
Raw political ambitions may be comparable to a drug-addicted prostitute who will do anything for the fix they need. And so it should come as no surprise that Kevin McCarthy would schedule a vote as he did to deny Minnesota representative Ilhan Omar a seat on the Foreign Affairs Committee, using the fraudulent argument that she has made anti-Semitic comments against Jews. It was a baseless tit-for-tat against the Democrats because the vile cretinsMarjorie Green and Paul Gosar were removed from their committee assignments by then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi for making Violent threats against their Democratic colleagues. But it was worse; though congresswoman Omar apologized for comments deemed anti-Semitic (which she should not have done), it was not enough for the weak and feckless Kevin McCarthy; he needed a scapegoat, and Ms. Omar a former refugee, a black woman, and an immigrant made a rich target for McCarthy to use as appeasement fodder to his racist right-wing cabal in the insurrectionist conference. Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries moved immediately to seat her on the House Budget Committee.
Two crushed-suited cheap suits parading as leaders.
McCarthy also targeted two of his California Democratic colleagues, Representatives Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell, whom he gratuitously removed from their Intelligence committee assignments. Kevin McCarthy’s move to oust the three Democrats is the latest example of a man willing to appease the racist gutter-rats in his conference. We all remembered Kevin Mccarthy standing in the well of the US House of Representatives, denouncing Donald Trump for weaponizing the racist white horde and unleashing them on Congress with the express to kill speaker Nancy Pelosi and Mike Pence, his own vice president, failed to unconstitutionally stop the certification of Joe Biden’s victory in 2021. Days later, the same McCarthy was at Mara Lago licking Donald Trump’s shoes with his tongue and singing a different tune. The sad reality is that America will have to trudge along with the equivalent of a crack-addicted prostitute who will do anything to remain speaker of the house. Made possible because of gerrymandering in Places like California and New York that allowed Republicans to do as they pleased in redrawing Congressional districts. Oh, by the way… It is not anti-Semitic to criticize people who claim to be Jews. No one is above criticism; I do not care who you are, and no one is untouchable. No one should allow themselves to be cowed into silence by any group, that includes those who would rationally and reasonably criticize black people. No one is above criticism. It is not racist or anti- Semetic to positively criticize any group or individual.
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Mike Beckles is a former Police Detective, businessman, freelance writer, black achiever honoree, and creator of the blog mikebeckles.com.
That the LAPD is confidently deploying this public relations tactic nearly three years after George Floyd’s death is a grim reflection of how little has changed.
People mourn Keenan Anderson in Santa Monica, Calif., on Jan. 14, 2022. Photo: Jacob Lee Green/Sipa via AP
THELOSANGELES Police Department is pushing the narrative that Keenan Anderson — a 31-year-old Black teacher, who LAPD cops held down and repeatedly tased as he begged for his life — is responsible for his own death.
Preliminary toxicology tests, performed on Anderson’s body by the police department itself, found traces of cannabinoids and cocaine metabolite in his system – results that in no way mitigate the extreme violence inflicted on Anderson by the police ahead of his January 3 death.
The drug tests were not released as part of an official autopsy; the Los Angeles County coroner’s office is still investigating Anderson’s death and has not yet ruled on its exact medical cause. Instead, the LAPD conducted its own drug tests and announced the results in an unambiguous effort to denigrate and blame its victim, the third man of color killed by the department in the few short weeks of 2023 alone
There’s nothing surprising about this sort of police practice. The idea that drug possession or use by Black people creates grounds enough to warrant police violence, even deadly violence, has undergirded half a century of U.S. policing. Cops from the department that murdered George Floyd attempted to blame his death on the fentanyl found present in his system, too, but thankfully without success.
If Anderson’s official autopsy undermines police claims that drugs played a role in his death, it would be a relief, but not a victory. Instead, the very willingness of the LAPD to release its toxicology report speaks to a much broader problem: the certain confidence in the public’s willingness to demonize and blame Black victims. If such racist narratives around drugs weren’t readily available, the police department wouldn’t have bothered releasing the toxicology results at all.
That the LAPD is confidently deploying this public relations tactic nearly three years after Floyd’s death is a grim reflection of how little has changed.
This should come as no surprise, either: The uprisings that followed Floyd’s murder were met with harsh state repression in the streets, aided by disavowals and dismissals across the media and political mainstream. The Democratic lawmakers who knelt ludicrously in kente cloth to signal their anti-racist credentials are the same leaders who have rejected every serious attempt to reckon with the racist violence that defines U.S. policing.
The reality of U.S. policing persists as a continuous, unrepentant, and reform-resistant threat to Black lives.
Calls to defund the police were deemed electorally radioactive, demands to abolish the police derided as delusional, police budgets further swelled, and impunity has continued to reign.
Police killed 1,176 people in 2022 — more killings than in any of the last 10 years. And while racial justice organizers and abolitionists continue to fight, the mass rebellions of 2020 were aggressively drained of political potency by an array of counterinsurgent forces, from mass arrests, media demonization, and, crucially, the complete and cowardly abandonment by liberal politicians on the city, state, and federal levels.
I don’t doubt pollsters’ findings, that voters in 2020 were turned off by the term “defund,” but I’m not interested in relitigating debates around electoral slogans. What matters is that the reality of U.S. policing persists as a continuous, unrepentant, and reform-resistant threat to Black lives.(From the intercept)
If you thought that these killers will stop because of the outcry against their actions, you need to guess again. Obviously, no one is safe from their murderous onslaught. This legless man was murdered after the five killers beat and killed Tyre Nichols in Memphis Tennessee.
The family of Anthony Lowe Jr is calling for justice after the 36-year-old double amputee was shot and killed by police officers in Huntington Park, California, last Thursday afternoon. In a confrontation captured on video by a bystander and posted to social media, Mr. Lowe, who uses a wheelchair, is seen holding a knife and scrambling away from multiple police officers who appear to be pointing weapons at him. Shortly thereafter, police shot Mr. Lowe multiple times and killed him. “You guys knew your lives weren’t in danger,” Mr. Lowe’s cousin Ellakenyada Gorum toldKCAL in Los Angeles. “He’s running on his limbs. How cold-hearted could they be?”
The Huntington Park Police Department told the television station that its officers responded to a call around 3:45 on Thursday afternoon from a man who reported that he had been stabbed by a man in a wheelchair. After police arrived at the scene, they found and confronted Mr Lowe. Police said the officers first attempted to taser Mr Lowe, but were unable to stop him from threatening them with the knife. Next, they shot him. The video below may be upsetting, but does not include footage of the shooting itself. To Mr Lowe’s family, the notion that police had to fatally shoot Mr Lowe to protect themselves strains credulity. “Be realistic about this, what could he have possibly done in a wheelchair?” Mr Lowe’s aunt, who did not provide her name, told the television station. “We want justice.” The shooting of Mr Lowe, a Black man, comes as police violence perpetrated against Black Americans is once again at the forefront of the national consciousness due to the killing of Trye Nichols by police in Memphis and the killing of Keenan Anderson by police in Los Angeles. Body camera footage of Mr Nichols’ death released last week sparked fresh outrage over the killing in Memphis and around the country, with Americans responding by participating in protests in multiple cities. Now, Mr Lowe’s family and community members are also calling for justice to be done in his case. https://mikebeckles.com/cop-fired-9-times-into-the-back-of-a-wheelchair-bound-man-killing-him/
It is not yet clear whether there is any body camera footage of the shooting of Mr Lowe. The footage of the incident captured by the bystander that is posted to social media does not include the shooting itself, while Huntington Park officials are thus far declining to release footage captured on a nearby business’ security camera and turned over to the sheriff.(this article originated @ Independent.co.uk.)
The injustice plaguing America is a byproduct of hatred taught in millions of homes nationwide. From those homes come young people who are going to colleges of all kinds from those colleges and universities, including military colleges. They are graduating and entering politics with the hatred taught them in their homes. And so we get military officers and politicians, lawyers and judges, and people who populate the public and private sectors. They rise to positions of tremendous power, including the prestigious positions of president, Supreme Court justices, and US senators. Then there are those at the bottom, cops, those who essentially did not do so well in school but want in on the power of whiteness, so they clamor to be a part of law enforcement. Through law enforcement, they get to wield immense power, including the power to take life. And so they opt for the crash course taught in the police academies, light in laws and human rights, heavy on subjugating, shooting to kill, and indoctrination on making people bow to their demands. After a few weeks of that crash course, they are fully empowered to do as they please to whomever they please. That is the military arm of white supremacy (the police) supported by those who never bothered attending college or could not cut it academically. Audio version of Article.
Depiction of slave patrol. White patrollers examine slave passes of the enslaved blacks. /Scan via Wikimedia Commons
LETUSBACKTRACK A LITTLE During the early enslavement of African people in the United States, the planters were concerned about the number of enslaved people being brought in. Not that they did not like the free labor and the ability to own other people, but their concerns were centered around maintaining control. As it is today, where real wealth is centered in the hands of a tiny few at the top, the planters also had concerns with the white population that did not have access to the life of luxury and opulence they enjoyed. So the problem was two-fold, the increasing number of black enslaved people and the impoverished white population that looked at their wealth suspiciously. A way had to be found to ensure a common cause was not established between the two groups. American racism was born. The strategy employed included hiring white overseers on the plantations and giving them carte blanch to do as they pleased with the enslaved blacks without consequence. They were allowed to beat, torture, rape, and abuse the slaves. Additionally, poor white trash was hired as slave patrols, individually and as collectives, to hunt down and capture runaways and return them to their masters. Although the white underclass resented the wealth and opulence of the super-rich plantation owners, they were happy to be given the power to supervise and hunt down runaways and to inflict punishment on them. They were happy to have someone to feel superior to. Their hatred for the captive black people far exceeded their envy of the wealth and opulence of their white counterparts.
THEDANGEROUSCLASS
Dr. Philip L. Reichel, Professor Emeritus of Sociology University of Northern Colorado in 2022, wrote, ‘the continual and obvious force developed by the South to control its version of the “dangerous classes” was the slave patrol. The demonization of enslaved black people as dangerous has roots dating back to the genesis of American slavery. The disingenuous thing about those who owned slaves was a disconnect in their reaction when their captives fled bondage. Reichel wrote. The portrayal of slaves as docile, happy, and generally content with their bondage has been successfully challenged in recent decades. We can today express amazement that slaveowners could have been unaware of their slaves’ unhappiness, yet some whites were continually surprised that slaves resisted their status. Such an attitude was not found only among Southern slaveowners. In a 1731 advertisement for a fugitive slave, a New England master was dismayed that this slave had run away “without the least provocation” (quoted in Foner, 1975: 264). Whether provoked in the eyes of slaveholders or not, slaves did resist their bondage. That resistance generally took three forms: running away, criminal acts, and conspiracies or revolts. Any of those actions constituted a danger to whites. The black enslaved population was not all docile; enslaved people found ingenious ways to fight back. Slave revolts and other means of resistance ensued though most of America’s history as a slave-holding nation has been scrubbed of these events. Poisoning became a treasured tool of the enslaved. According to Dr. Reichel, consistent with the earliest enforcement techniques identified in English and American history, the first means of controlling enslaved peoples was informal in nature. In 1686 a South Carolina statute said anyone could apprehend, chastise and send home any enslaved person found off their plantation without authorization. In 1690 such action was made everyone’s duty or be fined forty shillings (Henry, 1968: 31). Enforcement of slavery by the average citizen was not to be taken lightly. A 1705 act in Virginia made it legal “for any person or persons whatsoever, to kill or destroy such slaves (i.e., runaways)…without accusation or impeachment of any crime for the same.”
The movement of enslaved people was strictly regulated and enforced. Enslaved people found off the plantations on which they were captives without permission papers faced a gruesome death at the hands of anyone who desired to end their lives. After slavery, jim crow laws were created to keep the newly released black population in check. Sundown Towns became a thing all across the country. Sundown Towns still exist in the United States today, where black people know that if they are caught after sundown, death potentially awaits. Yes, in 2023. What makes it so shocking today, as it has been since slavery and directly after emancipation, is that assault on African-Americans in the United States is generally led by the police or whatever exists as law enforcement. Police are still authorized to use unconstitutional means to stop black people and demand their identification for no legitimate reason, and it’s all legal, according to the supreme court.
WHYISITIMPOSSIBLETOROOTOUTTHISVICIOUSLYWICKEDSYSTEM At present, the Republican party is the party mostly in defense of white supremacy and is opposed to expanding voting opportunities to all Americans who qualify. It is the party that stands in the way of police reform. The Republican Governor in Florida has taken extreme steps to limit the teaching of African-American history in high schools and colleges, labeling it ‘woke.’ The Republican majority on the supreme court in 2013 dismantled the 1965 voting rights act under the guise that there is no further need for the law because the conditions that existed that necessitated its passage are no longer here. It goes without saying that the reasoning was an outright lie by the John Roberts court. But dismantling the landmark voting rights law was a longstanding goal of Roberts, a former Reagan administration aide. Immediately after the decision of the court in Shelby County, Alabama V Holder, Republican-run States set about passing laws making it extremely more difficult to vote. They removed drop boxes, reduced early voting days, closed the majority of the polling stations in predominantly black neighborhoods, and Georgia even made it a crime to offer a person standing on a voting line a bottle of water. But that was not all; black voters were forced to stand in lines snaking around city blocks to vote. The process resulted in those voters having to spend up to ten hours in order to vote. To that voter, it means losing a day’s pay to cast their ballot. Losing a day’s pay is a humungous poll tax that African-Americans have been forced to pay since they were allowed to vote, something white voters in suburban and rural areas never have to worry about.
Several structural built-ins have worked efficiently to ensure the continuation of white supremacy, despite the country’s racial makeup changes. (1) The senate filibuster: In the Senate, a filibuster is an attempt to delay or block a vote on a piece of legislation or a confirmation. To understand the filibuster, it’s necessary first to consider how the Senate passes a bill. When a senator or a group of senators introduces a new bill, it goes to the appropriate committee for discussion, hearings, and amendments. If a majority of that committee votes in favor, the bill moves to the Senate floor for debate. Once a bill gets to a vote on the Senate floor, it requires a simple majority of 51 votes to pass after debate has ended. But there’s a catch: before it can get to a vote, it actually takes 60 votes to cut off debate, which is why a 60-vote supermajority is now considered the de facto minimum for passing legislation in the Senate. (Brennancenter.org) (1) Two US senators per state. Each state gets two US senators regardless of size or population. So Wyoming, with just over half a million residents statewide (578,803), has the same clout in the senate as California, with forty million (40, 000,000 )residents, or New York, with twenty million (20,000,000) residents. The math is simple, Wyoming, with a population of just over half a million residents, 92.4% of them white Caucasians, gets to cancel out the voices of California’s people of color, who make up a whopping 65.3% of that state’s population. (3) White minority rule: Intelligencer reports Republican senators haven’t represented a majority of the U.S. population since 1996 and haven’t together won a majority of Senate votes since 1998. Yet the GOP controlled the Senate from 1995 through 2007 (with a brief interregnum in 2001-02 after a party switch by Jim Jeffords) and again from 2015 until 2021Five Supreme Court justices (and many lower court judges) were confirmed by senates where the GOP majority was elected with less popular support than Democrats. Those right-wing hardliners are now poised to use their control over the court to attack voting rights and preserve Republican gerrymanders while striking down progressive policies. This same minority rule has also paved the way for massive tax cuts for the rich under George W. Bush and Donald Trump, facilitating economic inequality. Even though the US senate is almost evenly split between Republicans, who represent white supremacy, and the Democratic party, which represents everyone else, Democratic senators represent tens of millions more people than their Republican counterparts. Vox.comreported The implications of this malapportionment are breathtaking. Among other things, Justices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrettwere all nominated by a president who lost the popular vote and confirmed by a bloc of senators representing less than half the country. If the United States chose its leaders in free and fair elections, none of these individuals would serve on the Supreme Court — and Democratic appointees would likely have a majority on the Court. It goes further than Vox imagined; John Roberts the chief justice, and Samuel Alito were elected by president George W Bush who also lost the popular vote. Five of the six Republicans on the court taking away rights that Americans enjoyed for decades have been appointed by two presidents put in place against the wishes of the majority of the American people through the monstrosity called the Electoral college. No other so-called democratic nation has a system that ignores the majority of its voters and replaces their will with a convoluted system in which the loser becomes the winner.
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Mike Beckles is a former Police Detective, businessman, freelance writer, black achiever honoree, and creator of the blog mikebeckles.com.
I was a little surprised to see a rather long expose in the Jamaica Observer regarding the SSL Scandal that came to light recently, which included a tremendous loss of money to former track star Usain Bolt and others. My surprise is two-fold, despite the tremendous interest of the public to know what is happening in this serious matter, the somewhat lengthy raft of information released by the board and management of Stocks and Securities Limited (SSL), including specific date, time, and other crucial information is information that should be kept secret as part of a comprehensive criminal investigation into SSL.
Jamaica is steeped in many aspects of modernity, yet the small nation does not have the legislative or physical infrastructure to deal with the complexities of a functioning modern society. It is comparable to building highrise complexes yet having no infrastructure to fight fires that may break out in such complexes. The legislative framework needed to corral and contain institutions like SSL and others that control people’s assets is simply lacking. At the same time, the bureaucracy around opening a simple savings account by the little guy is astounding. To begin with, immediately after a breach of the size that fleeced Usain Bolt and others were discovered, the government should have stepped in and frozen all of the company’s assets and limited day-to-day operation to only under the steadfast gaze of government auditors. But this cannot occur in Jamaica because, as I have said repeatedly, Jamaica is not a nation of laws but a place where anything goes. It is a place where the so-called big man is king. People with money and connections do as they please. The fact that SSL has continued operating despite this scandal may prove that whatever sham investigation may occur is already compromised and doomed to unearth nothing but half-truths touching on low-hanging fruits. For an investigation to mean anything, the computers ot SSL should have been seized by a competent law enforcement agency immediately the scandal came to light. At the same time, company leaders should have been isolated from each other and interrogated individually. Instead, SSL seems to be operating as if nothing happened while the nation’s political leaders are reduced to making statements, none of which will bring to light exactly who are the people responsible. Even more shocking is the callous language being used by the board as it seeks to speak to the serious issue at hand but is obviously fuming that anyone dared to speculate as to what occurred at SSL. Here is the full response as reported by the Jamaica Observer.
“The Board and Management of Stocks and Securities Limited intended to facilitate law enforcement and other professional investigators as they probe the recent events at Stocks and Securities Limited, without making public comment. However, it has become necessary to set the record straight in respect of some damaging and widely repeated inaccuracies which suggest, inter alia, that the SSL directors and management sought to dispose of assets in order to frustrate efforts by authorities to take control of same. This is simply untrue. Here are the facts regarding that false allegation as well as some other canards.
Notification to the FSC
On Tuesday, January 10, 2023, Stocks and Securities Limited notified the Financial Services Commission of the discovery of apparent fraud and of the immediate steps being taken. The letter specifically stated: “This serves to advise the Financial Services Commission that Stocks and Securities Limited (SSL) is currently investigating allegations of alleged fraud committed by an employee serving in the role of Client Relationship Manager. The exposure is unknown, and SSL is currently undertaking investigations with the support of our attorneys, Guardsman Élite, and external auditors. The employee was interviewed by our attorneys on January 6 and 7, 2023 in the presence of her attorney and has admitted to wrongdoing. Other interviews are scheduled for the week of January 9, 2023, with known associates.
Nature of the suspected fraudulent activity by employee
At this time, it appears that the employee amended and generated fraudulent client documents including encashment requests and statements to circumvent the internal protocols.
Steps taken and next steps
The matter has been reported to the Board of Directors and communication to clients has commenced. The Company estimates that within seven (7) to fourteen (14) days there will be a reasonable estimate of the exposure, however, this is unknown at this time. SSL has confirmed that its insurance policy includes coverage for employee dishonesty and forgery with coverage up to US$1 million. Efforts are also being made to have the employee commit to restitution. The very next day, January 11, 2023, a representative of Dr the Hon Usain St Leo Bolt visited the offices of Stocks and Securities Limited and indicated that the said employee had turned up at their offices to confess that she had falsified statements provided to them, had stolen money from them and other SSL clients, and was requesting help from Dr. the Hon Usain St Leo Bolt’s management team to repay the clients whose funds she had stolen. It is believed that the reasons that she did not initially confess to defrauding this particular client are (1) she was aware of the tremendous spotlight which the Bolt name would bring to bear on her activities, and (2) amazingly, she, for whatever reason, and despite having admitted to the Bolt management team that Dr, the Hon Usain Bolt was among her victims, apparently still believed that she could borrow the money from the Bolt management group to repay the other SSL clients. The very first point at which the company became aware that the fraud affected this client was when the member of the Bolt management team visited SSL’s office, the former employee having omitted any mention of this client in her initial confession. Work had started to review all transactions related to those clients whom she had initially listed and to carry out the notifications to the FSC, JSE, affected clients, insurance, etc when the representative of Dr the Hon Usain St Leo Bolt visited the offices of Stocks and Securities Limited. The shock experienced by all was and remains palpable. While the company believed that the impact on the first identified 39 clients could be addressed with the coöperation of regulators, it was immediately apparent that the national and indeed, global stature of the last client impacted would likely make a measured and systematic approach to investigation very challenging indeed.
Why has SSL not commented publicly before today?
On Tuesday, January 10, 2023, SSL notified the FSC and on January 11, 2023, SSL issued a press release notifying the public that alleged fraud had been identified. At the time of the FSC notice, SSL was unaware of any alleged fraud related to Dr the Hon Usain St Leo Bolt’s holding company. SSL appointed a trustee on January 16, 2023, and the Financial Services Committee appointed a Special Investigator and Temporary Manager on January 17, 2023. Practically, the FSC through their Temporary Manager has had control over the entity so SSL has not been in a position to respond publicly or clarify allegations.
Did the Directors and Shareholders of SSL attempt to wind up the entity in contravention of FSC
instructions? Emphatically No. The appointment of the Trustee was notified to the FSC on January 12, 2023, and discussions were ongoing. SSL appointed Mr. Caydion Campbell of Phoenix Restructuring, Advisory and Insolvency Services Enterprise (PRAISE) as Trustee under the Companies Act of Jamaica effective Monday, January 16, 2023. SSL’s directors and shareholders met that day to confirm the appointment, in keeping with the work plan submitted to the FSC by management. It was the intention of the directors that their powers and authority be vested in the Trustee and that the affairs of SSL would be under his control. The further intention was that the Trustee and his team would conduct an Independent Business Review (“IBR”) and other investigations into SSL’s operations to determine, among other things, its financial state of affairs as of the date 16 January 2023. The purpose of the appointment was not, we repeat, not to wind up the company. Among Mr. Campbell’s key objectives were intended to be to ensure that all necessary conservatory measures were in place over the assets of SSL, as well as to ensure compliance with the enhanced governance protocols as directed by the FSC. It was intended that he would also use the results of the IBR to explore the restructuring and reorganization options that were available to preserve and enhance the value of the business, operations, and undertakings of SSL for the benefit of all its stakeholders. Once agreed with the FSC, a resolution plan would have been developed and implemented. Mr. Campbell is a Trustee licensed under the Insolvency Act by the Supervisor of Insolvency. He has 30 years’ experience in Corporate Recoveries, Turnaround Management, Proposals, Receiverships and Bankruptcies. He also has extensive experience in providing professional services in the areas of financial analysis, due diligence, independent business review, business reorganization and dispute analysis investigation.
The answer is again, No. Disciplinary proceedings which ultimately ended with her termination were commenced in September 2022. The hearings were delayed for a number of reasons, primarily related to her medical issues. Specifically, it was discovered that she had produced a false statement to a client of SSL. After investigations and meetings with the client and his attorney, it was confirmed that there was no fraudulent activity by the employee (ie. no evidence of cash being stolen) in relation to that client, although the employee’s actions may well have been preparatory to committing fraud in respect of the client. The disciplinary panel ultimately recommended that the employee be dismissed for her negligence and gross incompetence.
Why did SSL not discover the alleged fraud committed against WellJen Limited (Dr the Hon Usain St Leo Bolt’s holding company)?
On December 20, 2022, a client presented a statement that he said was generated by the former employee and when compared with the portfolio statement was found to be inaccurate. SSL immediately engaged a team to commence investigations into the employee’s activities. During the holiday period, discussions with her attorney commenced simultaneously and by the first week of January 2023, it was agreed that she would provide a confession. By January 6 and 7, 2023 SSL had obtained a statement from the former employee, provided in the presence of her attorney, and sworn before a Justice of the Peace. Her confession revealed that 39 clients had been defrauded (not including WellJen Limited), and investigations commenced to determine the precise sum that had been stolen. The matter was reported to the Board of Directors on the first business day after the confession – January 9, 2023. On January 10, 2023, the FSC was notified. And on January 11, 2023 SSL was notified of the confession she made directly to the team of Dr the Hon Usain St Leo Bolt at his office. No current board members or managers were aware that Dr the Hon Usain St Leo Bolt had an account given: 1. The account was not held in his name; and 2. The account did not from 2018, have balances which would have flagged it as a high-value account.
What is the nature of the investments that were subject to fraud?
As a licensed securities dealer, SSL facilitates clients’ investments in securities – including local and international stocks and bonds. SSL has had an enviable reputation over the years for the management of client portfolios, particularly in international instruments, and therefore it has been one of the institutions of choice for high-net-worth individuals, families, and companies. The former employee was well respected in the industry and was trusted completely by her clients. She abused this trust in various ways for her own personal enrichment. She confessed to modifying and fabricating requests to sell securities, and to using various techniques to steal the proceeds of the liquidation of the securities.
Why was the alleged fraud not detected before?
Investigations and a review of all processes will be required to determine the complete answer to this question. SSL has an online system that all clients can use to track their portfolio performance. In fact, this system is considered one of the best in the world and accurately shows clients’ portfolio holdings. Unfortunately, it is common to the affected clients that they did not use the online system, but rather, relied on statements generated by the former employee, which undoubtedly was the likely reason they were targeted. In her confession, the employee indicated that she conducted transactions for clients outside of SSL’s systems, she continued to make payments to those clients from the pool of funds which she herself had personally accumulated. This meant that the clients would not have been aware of the condition of the actual account at SSL because they were being paid according to their requests. Being trusted by clients, she was given a great deal of latitude by them. It is now known that some clients even provided pre-signed undated encashment letters.
Did SSL use the funds defrauded from clients in their operations?
No. SSL Board and Management does not know how or where the funds stolen from clients of SSL were used. Client funds and Proprietary Funds (Funds for SSL’s operations) are entirely separate, with separate departments and controls to ensure they are not mixed. There are clients that have also invested in, or participated in debt offerings by SSL or its related entities (ie. They provided loans). These are normal activities. The FSC conducted an audit between February and June 2019 and no such irregularities were detected.
Did SSL have previous breaches and did SSL do anything about them?
Not all breaches relate to fraud or fraudulent activity. There was no indication of any fraud or use of client funds by SSL in any audits, whether by independent auditors or by the FSC. It is not uncommon for financial entities to have breaches of some nature or another. This usually results in Directives from the regulator, primarily relating to timeframes for addressing these issues. SSL recognized the consequences of non-compliance with directives and took the requisite steps to address them.
Is SSL a failed entity?
There has been no ‘run’ to date on investments made through SSL. The vast majority of clients have not been affected by fraud. Nevertheless, trust in the entity has been deeply damaged. The rumour mill continues to generate unfounded claims, while the confessed perpetrator remains at home.
How would SSL have resolved this matter?
SSL self-reported to the FSC and the public when the fraud was discovered. Between the first meeting with the FSC on January 12, 2023, and the appointment of the Temporary Manager by the FSC on January 16, 2023 there was one business day. The plan, as outlined, was to appoint a Trustee to manage the entity, independently support the FSC’s investigation, and work with all stakeholders to see how the entity could be restructured. SSL contacted its insurers on January 11, 2023, and Shareholders and Investors were also willing to examine arrangements to provide restitution to affected clients. Other financial entities that have been hit by financial problems of one type or other have had the opportunity to execute their work plans, however, the incorrect impression appears to be that SSL has taken no steps and had no plan.
Conclusion
The events that have unfolded have had tremendous adverse consequences for the affected clients, and for the hard-working staff at SSL. The former employee’s dishonesty has led to the most widely publicized news event from Jamaica in recent years. The Board and Management had 5 business days between the confession and the FSC taking over the entity. During that time steps were taken to engage auditors, report the matter to the authorities, and hold meetings with stakeholders and the FSC. The fire has been fueled by sensational speculation, which tends to affect adversely the essential tracing of ill-gotten assets and indeed, the overall investigation, activities that the Board and Management were and are prepared to support. The Management of SSL continues to go to work every single day to support the FSC, FID, and Fraud Squad in their work. These staff members are mindful of the attacks and assertions which have been made on them from various quarters, while the former employee who confessed remains at home. This is extremely demoralizing for those who continue to work hard to try to ensure justice is done. Jamaica has a highly reputable financial market, with a sound regulatory framework operating at international standards. This remains so despite the recent spate of cases of fraud at various financial institutions. A few bad apples, who do what fraudsters do – find ways to beat the system – should not cast doubt and suspicion on the many thousands who toil daily to preserve the integrity of the sector. Justice should be the objective for all affected clients, famous or unknown. That is our aim and we will continue to support that objective in every way possible.”
End.….….….….….….….….….….….….….
The information laid out by the SSL board though critical to the public’s need to know must be weighed against the more important task of bringing to justice the perpetrator/s of this crime. Some, if not all, of the information laid out by the board is almost assuredly information that will form part of any future criminal investigation and should not have been released by the board. The tone of the letter appears to reflect annoyance, even anger, at what it seems to see as a mere nuisance rather than the serious issue it is. The assurance given by the board that clients are protected up to the tune of US 1 million is cold comfort to those who are reported to have lost upward of US $12 million. The annoyance/anger that the members of the SSL board appear to feel at this intrusive spotlight on their comfy space is of zero importance as it argues the following contradictorily.»»»> “SSL has an online system that all clients can use to track their portfolio performance. In fact, this system is considered one of the best in the world and accurately shows clients’ portfolio holdings. Unfortunately, it is common to the affected clients that they did not use the online system, but rather, relied on statements generated by the former employee, which undoubtedly was the likely reason they were targeted. In her confession, the employee indicated that she conducted transactions for clients outside of SSL’s systems, she continued to make payments to those clients from the pool of funds which she herself had personally accumulated. How good can SSL system be if an employee can conduct business outside of the company’s systems, as stated in the lengthy canard that the board rendered obviously to shift blame from itself?
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Mike Beckles is a former Police Detective, businessman, freelance writer, black achiever honoree, and creator of the blog mikebeckles.com.
I mean, they cannot help themselves. It seems every aspect of their job is an opportunity to live out Rambo fantasies. Consequently, America’s streets and what used to be the sacred sanctums for Americans, their homes, are now open targets for police to play battlefield soldiers. It will only get worse as politicians from both political parties who are lapdogs to the wealthy stand in the way of restructuring how police are allowed to operate. As long as America benefits from locking up millions of its citizens through unjust drug laws and minor traffic infractions, the soldiers looking for war will continue to wreak havoc across the country. It has become clearer by the day that, based on how they train these monsters, they are all hammers and the rest of us are nails.(mb) https://mikebeckles.com/why-they-run-from-police/
Every day the atrocities get worse
A Texas police chief is on leave after a SWAT team wrecked a Galveston family’s home during a raid in search of a murder suspect who wasn’t there and turned out to be the wrong guy, officials say. Erika Rios and her teenage children were awakened in their beds around 2 a.m. on Jan. 22 by a voice on a megaphone booming outside, saying they were Galveston Police, she told The Daily News. Glass shattered as police fired less-than-lethal rounds through windows, kicked in doors and damaged wiring, Rios told the outlet. “We were all so confused,” she said, according to The Daily News. “When they dragged me out, I was left with a bruise and scrape on my right thigh.” Police were looking for a 17-year-old named Cameron Vargas in connection to the killing of Malik Dunn, a 25-year-old found shot to death two days earlier on Jan. 20, KPRC reported. Vargas is a friend of Rios’ son and had been at the home but left hours earlier, Rios told the station. https://mikebeckles.com/court-sanctioned-pre-textual-traffic-stops-a-tool-police-use-to-escalate-violence/
Galveston police chief Doug Balli was placed on 10-day administrative leave.
“I was scared, screaming,” Rios’ daughter Chelsea Peralez said, according to KPRC. ”I ended up going to my brother, asking what they were doing, and they continuously kept shooting the wooden pellets.” Vargas was taken into custody on Jan. 23, but charges were dropped on Jan. 25, court documents show. Investigators cleared Vargas as a suspect, outlets reported. City officials put Police Chief Doug Balli on 10-day administrative leave in the aftermath of the raid. The city manager “is conducting an internal investigation into the chief’s conduct. Specifically, city administration is investigating a failure of communication surrounding a search performed in the early morning hours of January 22,” the City of Galveston said in an emailed news release to McClatchy News. Officials did not elaborate on the exact nature of the “failure of communication.” Assistant Police Chief Andre Mitchell has stepped in to fill the role in Balli’s absence, officials said. McClatchy News reached out to Galveston police regarding the raid and subsequent investigation into Balli, but did not receive an immediate response. “I’ve been left with traumatized kids, no heat in my home and busted windows, all because they were looking for somebody who didn’t even live there, who was also innocent,” Rios told The Daily News. “I’m trying to repair what I can and heal my kids, but it’s hard as a single mother. It has been a whirlwind and it was all so unnecessary.” The Buzbee Law Firm, which is representing the Rios family, has scheduled a press conference for 11 a.m. Wednesday, Feb.
The Memphis Police Department has today suspended another officer in the beating death of Tyre Nichols. His name is Preston Hemphill.
In addition to the other violent animals who murdered mister Nichols Preston Hemphill was removed quietly. Hemphill deployed his Taser during the confrontation. In his own body camera video, Hemphill is seen chasing Nichols down the road but then turns back to the scene of the initial traffic stop.
Many people are naively shocked at the speed with which the five black cops were terminated and charged with second-degree murder. As I maintained, there is no reason to be surprised. It would be surprising if they weren’t thrown out and allowed to fend for themselves based on their skin color. Juxtapose that with the way Preston Hemphill’s involvement is being handled and. Hemphill was heard on his body camera video saying twice, “I hope they stomp his a – .” Hemphill, who is white, has not been fired or charged. Hemphill “was relieved when the other officers were relieved,” a Memphis police spokesperson said on Monday.
Attorneys for Nichols’ family, Ben Crump and Antonio Romanucci, said they were extremely disappointed that Hemphill was relieved of duty but not fired or charged. The lawyers are also questioning why the Memphis police did not immediately announce Hemphill’s name or that he was relieved of duty.
“Why is his identity and the role he played in Tyre’s death just now coming to light?” they said in a statement. “We have asked from the beginning that the Memphis Police Department be transparent with the family and the community — this news seems to indicate that they haven’t risen to the occasion. It certainly begs the question why the white officer involved in this brutal attack was shielded and protected from the public eye, and to date, from sufficient discipline and accountability. The Memphis Police Department owes us all answers.”(ABCNEWSREPORTED)
While Florida’s El Duce is busy trying to stifle black studies in that state that would inform all races about what really happened to blacks in America there is real trouble in Ohio where they are actively indoctrinating small children into becoming Nazis.
The Department of Education in Ohio is investigating the openly antisemitic and racist Nazi homeschooling group with thousands of members being operated by a couple from Upper Sandusky, Ohio, an official at the department told VICE News. On Sunday, VICE News and the Huffington Post reported that Logan and Katja Lawrence were the operators of the neo-Nazi Dissident Homeschool group which now boasts over 2,500 members on its Telegram channel, based on the research from anti-fascist researchers at the Anonymous Comrades Collective. The group openly advocates white supremacist ideologies with the aim to make sure the children they teach “become wonderful Nazis.”
The Lawrences share their classroom schedules, homework assignments, and lesson plans with other parents in the group, the vast majority of which are infused with Nazi ideology or open praise for Adolf Hitler.
Katja Lawrence, 37, also shares examples of how her family embraces Nazi ideology, including baking a Führer cake for Hitler’s birthday and sharing a recording of her children shouting “sieg heil.”
“I am outraged and saddened,” Stephanie Siddens, the interim superintendent of public instruction at the Department of Education told VICE News. “There is absolutely no place for hate-filled, divisive and hurtful instruction in Ohio’s schools, including our state’s home-schooling community. I emphatically and categorically denounce the racist, antisemitic and fascist ideology and materials being circulated.”
Under Ohio state laws, the Lawrences simply have to inform the local superintendent that they want to homeschool their children and agree to abide by certain broad conditions in order to legally keep their children out of public schools.
The Ohio Department of Education is now actively reviewing compliance with statutory and regulatory requirements as a result of the media reports, a spokesperson for the department told VICE News.
One age-old question asked when people try to run from the police, and things go wrong is, ‘why do they run’? The question ‘pretends’ not to understand the most basic instinct of all living species to be free. If we set aside that pretense, in many cases, when someone runs from the police, even if they are guilty of a crime, they stand a chance of getting away with it.….…at least in their mind at the time. Years ago, I wrote an article about some of the perils law enforcement face in Jamaica, where I was engaged in law enforcement for a decade, not the least of which was the mountainous terrain. Even in cases of murder, if there are no eyewitnesses to the crime, once the offender jumps into a gully, he stands an almost 100% chance of getting away with that murder. Why do they run? To understand why people run from law enforcement in the United States, we must first understand what law enforcement has been from its inception to black Americans. Let’s begin!!! On the website of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is the following paragraph. The origins of modern-day policing can be traced back to the “Slave Patrol.” The earliest formal slave patrol was created in the Carolinas in the early 1700s with one mission: to establish a system of terror and squash slave uprisings with the capacity to pursue, apprehend, and return runaway slaves to their owners. Tactics included using excessive force to control and produce desired slave behavior. https://mikebeckles.com/it-is-about-the-warrior-cop-it-cannot-be-fixed/
“I [patroller’s name], do swear, that I will as searcher for guns, swords, and other weapons among the slaves in my district, faithfully, and as privately as I can, discharge the trust reposed in me as the law directs, to the best of my power. So help me, God.” North Carolina Slave Patrol Oath. https://mikebeckles.com/5‑fired-memphis-officers-charged-with-murder-in-death-of-tyre-nichols/
The NAACP argues: By the 1900s, local municipalities began establishing police departments to enforce local laws in the East and Midwest, including Jim Crow laws. Local municipalities leaned on police to enforce and exert excessive brutality on African Americans who violated any Jim Crow laws. Jim Crow Laws continued through the end of the 1960s. End quote.
I’m afraid I have to disagree with the NAACP that Jim Crow Laws ended toward the end of the 1960s. Jim Crow laws and the method of enforcement remain to this day. So for one to get an appreciation for why black people run from the police, one has to understand at least what policing has been to black Americans as opposed to their white counterparts. Black people running from the police is an act of freedom, just as the enslaved black people ran from the oppressive monstrosity of slavery and the genocidal system that kept them enslaved. To argue, ‘all they have to do is to comply with the police,’ is the most uniquely white privileged thing to say. It creates the false impression that the system looks at blacks the same way as it does whites. To assert that compliance with the police guarantees equal and fair treatment is by itself steeped in either ignorance or delusion. To a young black male being stopped by the police, complying could easily mean being arrested on trumped-up felony charges resulting in years in prison for crimes they never committed. For them, fleeing is the best recourse. As it was for their ancestors fleeing the slave patrols, it is equally the same today; being caught has similar consequences, yes, even death. For those of you who would come out the side of your faces to question the veracity of the latter statement, tell it to Tyre Nichols. The 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery in the United States, purposely retained a clause reinforcing the continuation of slavery. Section 1: Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States or any place subject to their jurisdiction. See, e.g., Clyatt v. United States, 197 U.S. 207, 215 (1905). One doesn’t need a law degree from Harvard to recognize that slavery has not ended conceptually, based on section (1). To any young black male, whether he committed a crime or not, being stopped by the police is a clear and present danger of going into slavery. It is not called slavery today; it is the prison industrial complex. Those who coined the language in section (1) of the 13th Amendment were fully aware of what they were doing in the language. ‘Except as a punishment for crime,’ understanding that the mass incarceration of blacks would be the next iteration and continuation of the enslavement of black Americans. https://mikebeckles.com/court-sanctioned-pre-textual-traffic-stops-a-tool-police-use-to-escalate-violence/
Many well-intentioned commentators on police violence, including yours, truly have, from time to time, argued that American policing is broken. Yes, in terms of how police officers are supposed to operate, it can reasonably be argued it is broken. In terms of the intent behind the way policing was designed to work in the United States, it is working exactly as modeled. What makes it so offensive to the sensibilities of conscientious people is the gruesome barbarism of it when it is held up to the light of scrutiny. No one should be delusional about how police violence is viewed among a large subset of the white community, however. Operating from the anonymity of their keyboards, in group chats, and on message boards, a truer picture of who they are emerges. From this rancid pool comes cops, prosecutors, judges, politicians, and their supporters that stand in the way of reform. When the laws are written to impact a particular group directly and enforced with the same mindset, the results are what we have with the incarceration rate of blacks in the United States. Scratching the surface of the definitive intent to lock up black Americans puts to rest the lie that blacks are more likely to commit crimes than whites who are not policed the same way. Why do they run? For the majority of the keyboard warriors who pontificate about, ‘why do they run’? They dod not want and answer, their question is the point. The next time you ask that question, remember what you just read. https://mikebeckles.com/white-women-continue-to-glorify-in-the-destruction-of-black-bodies/
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Mike Beckles is a former Police Detective, businessman, freelance writer, black achiever honoree, and creator of the blog mikebeckles.com.
A woman was arrested in Westminster, Colorado, on Jan. 24 following an argument with a man outside of a Party City store. Charleene Gibson was arrested following an altercation with the man near 92nd Avenue and Sheridan Boulevard. Gibson was arrested after the incident took place in front of the party supplies store in suburban Denver with a man who tried to take a picture of her car parked near the entrance. However, Gibson said she was there to stock up on supplies for her birthday and had parked close to the front door after receiving permission from the store clerk. “The Party City employee said it was OK to park there for a few minutes while we load balloons in the car. I stayed in the car and turned my hazards on,” said Gibson. Gibson said she stepped in front of his lens when the man tried to take a picture of her car after complaining she’d blocked the curb ramp. Gibson said that’s when the man attacked her and hit her several times before she struck him back. “Then he grabbed me,” she said. “And punched me in my jaw, and then he yanked me again and then punched me two times right here, and that’s when I started to punch him back.”A video of the arrest went viral, which captured the police arresting Gibson as a friend who witnessed the argument, NiaShay Burns, recorded the arrest on her cellphone. Burns is heard on the video repeatedly saying, “He hit her first!”
Burns can be heard on the video telling the officers that three women plus another witness were telling them that the man hit her first as a male officer handcuffed Gibson. A female officer moved to arrest Gibson’s sister Amber after she seemingly began to try to walk away from the scene after seeing Gibson being put in handcuffs. As the officer shoved Amber against a vehicle, Burns cried out, “She didn’t do anything!” The female officer later grabbed Gibson’s arm forcibly and escorted her to one of several police vehicles as Burns again told the officers, “You guys! He hit her first!” After asking the police officers if the man was going to jail, one of the police officers told Burns that the man would be receiving a citation and was not being arrested. “So, he’s not going to jail, but he hit her first, and he’s a man and she’s a woman,” Burns replied. “Wait, wait, I’m confused.” “I understand that,” replied one police officer. “We can go over this at f— court, OK?” Burns later captured the man standing in the doorway of the store and said, “This man punched my cousin in the face, and he’s not going to jail but she is.” Gibson was arrested for 3rd-degree felony assault of an at-risk adult because of the man’s age. He is 74 years old. Burns shared the video on TikTok with the caption, “Went to jail for defending herself while the guy a white man at that who punched her got a summons share this help us fight this.”
According to local reports, the man received a ticket for misdemeanor third-degree assault as well as disorderly conduct. The man told the police that Gibson knocked his phone out of his hand. One witness claimed that the women assaulted the man after cornering him, but another said that the man punched Gibson in the face and that the other two women came and tried to help her. “When we were tussling and moving around, my sister Amber was trying to get him off of me,” said Gibson. “He was antagonizing us, saying stuff like ‘bring it on.’” Local news outlet 9News reported that after they began asking questions regarding the arrest video, the Westminster Police Department called Gibson to advise her they were no longer charging her with felony assault and had downgraded her charge to misdemeanor disorderly conduct. The WPD claimed the witnesses gave conflicting statements and they dropped the felony charge after talking with the District Attorney. Additionally, an investigation has been launched into how the officers handled the arrest. Burns is certain that without that video evidence, Gibson would still be facing a felony charge. “If I didn’t have my phone and I didn’t take it out in this situation, she would have gotten a felony charge.” Burns said. “I don’t want to sugarcoat it, but I do — like, that’s what it is. It’s because of the color of our skin,” added Gibson. “It’s the fact that we were upset and expressing ourselves —that I went to jail.” (Atlantablackstar.com)
People continue to, tongue in cheek, argue that ‘not all cops are racist ignoramuses.’ I guess we should take some solace from this new lie; after all, it’s an improvement over the traditional spiel, “there are only a few rotten apples,” but the evidence to the contrary is so overwhelming we are at the,’ not all are bad’ stage from the cop-apologists. If we have to say ‘not all are bad,’ it is already evident that we are in a serious crisis. At this point, I would argue that one would be lucky to find a decent constitution-respecting cop in an entire department. The police culture in the United States is so broken that, at this point, it is impossible to fix without completely revamping how police are allowed to operate across the board. It is important to [note] for the record, as sociologists and other experts grapple with finding reasons for the increase in violent crimes, that distrust and disconnect be seen as the main reason. The dangerous police culture that exists is so well-embedded that even when millions of people throughout the country of all races take to the streets to demand change, they are not smart enough to change their filthy ways. Reporting on police violence, Marshallproject.org wrote; ‘More than two years after millions of Americans took to the streets following the murder of George Floyd, familiar stories about police violence persist. By the numbers, 2021 was the deadliest for police shootings since The Washington Post began tracking them in 2015. The database Mapping Police Violence found similar results. The year 2022 was even worse as police killed more than 1200 Americans, most unarmed and with mental issues. American police do not have a training issue; they have a bloodlust issue. The sad irony is that for black motorists, there is a greater threat to their lives from police than from any other source. In fact, black motorists losing their lives to other criminals from merely driving down a street or highway is not a thing. Those of you who would argue this is hyperbolic, do not come for me; look up Sandra Bland, Philando Castile, Tyre Nichols, Daunte Wright, Patrick Lyoya, and on and on the killings go. The Guardian, which has been mapping police violence in recent years, reported in 2022 that police in the US have killed nearly 600 people during traffic stops since 2017, with the deaths continuing apace this year, a review of national police violence data shows. For decades American law enforcement enjoyed an internationally whitewashed persona, mostly burnished by Hollywood movies and television shows that glorified policing in ways that no reasonable person would have a problem with. Realistically, none of this was true. The reality for African-Americans who bore the brunt of police oppression in the United States was far removed from the glitz and glamor of Hollywood faux depictions. Black Americans wrongly convicted by corrupt police and prosecutors, in some cases, have spent decades of their lives incarcerated. In contrast, others, not so lucky, have been executed for crimes they did not commit. Thanks to conscientious entities like the Innocence Project and others that have been awakened to the atrocities being committed against innocent people of color. The culture of impunity that has taken over American policing can be traced to the so-called rise of the warrior cop. As I have written in several other articles, the impunity you see police exhibit is a direct result of the immunity created for them by the Supreme Court. Congress did not legislate qualified immunity; it was created and foisted on the American people by the unelected robed bureaucrats on the highest court. Qualified immunity carved out unreasonable and unconscionable standards for state actors that the average American does not enjoy. It essentially sets government workers outside the scope of the laws unless the aggrieved party can show that a cop, for example, should have known that their action was outside of the law based on previous cases. No American citizen acting outside government service has such grace under the laws. If you break the law, you go to jail, end of story. Additionally, police departments have been purposefully hiring soldiers returning from America’s foreign wars. Many of these hires have serious issues that needed to be sorted out; sticking a badge on their chest and giving them a gun and the power to kill does not help. From the beginning, this writer said it was a bad idea.…. unless, of course, the outcomes we are having are the ones they desired. Every cop-apologist, every American, in fact, every person on this planet should watch this video before opening their mouth on the issue of American police killings. This is David Allan Grossman, born in Frankfurt, West Germany on August 23, 1956. His career includes service in the U.S. Army. Grossman is an author who also lectures police on how to kill effectively. Those interested can research what this former military officer has been teaching America’s cops. There is no reforming this; the whole thing must be discarded if the killings are to stop.
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