Alleged ISIS Threat in Iraq, Syria, Is Perfect U.S. Excuse for Increased Airport Surveillance

The Obama administration may ask overseas partners to enhance security measures at airports and is weighing whether to do the same here at home to address deepening concerns that terrorists in war-ravaged Syria are trying to develop a new generation of bombs that could be smuggled onto commercial planes, ABC News has learned.
"[This threat] is different and more disturbing than past aviation plots," one source said.
The issue was discussed this past week at the White House during a meeting of top-level officials from intelligence agencies, sources said.
For months the Department of Homeland Security, FBI and other agencies have been quietly debating whether to boost the U.S. security posture and encourage overseas partners to take action too. The agencies have also been debating whether to make a public announcement on potential new security measures at airports.
The back-and-forth has been based on intelligence showing that a particularly extreme "subset" of terrorist groups in Syria was working alongside operatives from al Qaeda's prolific offshoot in Yemen to produce "creative" new designs for bombs, as one source put it.
Specifically, U.S. officials learned that associates of the al Qaeda affiliate in Syria -- the Al Nusrah Front -- and radicals from other groups were teaming up with elements of the Yemen-based group Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which built such innovative devices as the "underwear bomb" that ultimately failed to detonate in a plane over Detroit on Christmas Day 2009.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/syria-threat-prompt-airports/story?id=24351979

Promising 19 Yr Old Shot in the Head by Police, is Killed

Denzel “Jaba” Curnell, 19, died from a bullet wound to the head after an encounter with a South Carolina police officer on Friday night in, what authorities claim, was a suicide. But witnesses tell a different story, reports the Charleston City Paper.
Several witnesses, who refused to be named, say that Officer Jamal Medlin told Curnell to get down and put his hands behind his head as he walked through Charleston’s Bridgeview Village apartments. And once he did that, Medlin allegedly shot him in the back.
An autopsy, however, revealed that Curnell died from a bullet wound to the right side of his head—which still raises difficult questions, reports the Post and Courier.
Curnell, according to family, is left-handed and had everything to live for.
“He wanted to travel in the military. He wanted to get married and have children. His life was cut down at an early age,” said his aunt Sylvia Campbell.

http://newsone.com/3026965/denzel-jaba-curnell-unarmed-sc-teen-killed-by-police-officer/

Dept of Homeland Security Did Heavy Un-American Surveillance of Occupy Protesters

Newly released documents made public for the first time this week reveal how the United States Department of Homeland Security coordinated with local law enforcement across the US to monitor the Occupy Wall Street movement.
The New York Times in conjunction with the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund say the DHS has provided them with 4,000 page of government documents pertaining to how the US agency relied on nationally dispersed “fusion centers” to share and disseminate intelligence about the Occupy movement in late 2011 after it launched in Lower Manhattan that November.
Rather than demonstrating any blatantly egregious and certainly illegal surveillance tactics employed against protesters, however, the documents instead show how DHS-fusion centers from Florida to Massachusetts monitored their local OWS chapters using publically available social media postings and other open source investigation.
“In many cases, law enforcement officials appeared to simply assemble or copy lists of protests or related activities, sometimes maintaining tallies of how many people might show up,” Colin Moynihan wrote for the Times on Friday. “They also noted appearances by prominent Occupy supporters and advised other officials about what — or whom — to watch for, according to the newly disclosed documents.”
Indeed, fusion center employees shared with colleagues across the country as much information as possible about rallies, marches and other gatherings arranged at OWS encampments as more sprang up across the US following the start of an occupation in New York City’s Zuccotti Park in November 2011.
The Times have published just 77-pages—a mere sampling of the 4,000 pages of documents they say they received through Freedom of Information Act requests, but the files nevertheless showcase how federal officials alerted one another on a regular basis upon the happenings at certain encampments.

http://rt.com/usa/161152-dhs-fusion-center-occupy/

Former Philadelphia Police Commissioner: ‘Welcome to Police Industrial Complex’

Dangerous, alienating, and sociopathic: the policy of arming police to the teeth with military-grade gear shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how crime is solved and what it means for a cop to walk the beat, former Captain Ray Lewis told RT.
Nine-foot tall, 55,000 pound, Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) armored-fighting vehicles rolling through the streets of America.
Millions of dollars’ worth of military gear being distributed to local police forces on an annual basis.
Drones, M-16s and so many other hand-me-downs from over a decade of war making their way from US forces abroad to a local police force near you.
If you really believe any of this is making you safer, Lewis, who spent 24 years on the force, says you should think again. Endangering lives, alienating communities, turning minority neighborhoods into occupied territory and compromising the very ability for police to do their jobs; these are just a few of the reasons the former commissioner believes main street is being sold down the river for power-hungry cops and ruthless corporate interest.
RT: Why is this considered to be a good idea, bringing these high caliber weapons into US streets?
Ray Lewis: I don’t think it’s a good idea. High caliber weapons are extremely dangerous. They have a very high ricocheting velocity, and that means that innocent people are going to get killed and injured. They can go through doors, they can go through cinder block, they can go through metal car doors, and this type of velocity is not necessary. I spent 24 years in the Philadelphia Police Department.We upgraded our Smith and Wessons to Glocks, which are a very powerful pistol that work very well. There is no reason to have anything stronger than that, except in exigent circumstances, in which your SWAT team does have that type of weapon. For anyone else, they’re not necessary and they’re dangerous.
RT: You know Captain, one might ask, will this equipment not obscure the line between soldier and police officers, especially in those small communities where they’re already being distributed?
RL: Yes, it will obviously obscure the line between the military and the police. But I’m not at all concerned with small communities that you mentioned. I’m concerned with the large cities, where you have large minority populations living in economically depressed areas. That’s where you’re going to have problems. You bring this type of equipment into a minority area, you are going to make those people feel as if they are living in an occupied territory. You’re going to alienate them.

"...innocent people are going to get killed and injured." What happens is, you get a halo effect. A halo effect means that that alienation transfers to all the other officers in that department. That alienation transfers to the officers in the patrol cars, the officer on the foot beat, the officers in the community relations division. So bringing that type of equipment is going to alienate people from all parts of the police department. What people don’t know is that input from community members is one of the most important ways crimes are solved. They know the bad guys in the area, they hear the rumors, they hear the gossip, they know what’s going on in their communities. Too many people think that crime is solved through high-tech forensic labs or exemplary investigative work. Not true, although these two come in very handy in many cases, most of your information about crimes comes from the community. You bring this military type of mindset into the community, you’re not going to get the interaction from the members of that community.  

 http://rt.com/usa/166260-police-military-industrial-complex/

Baltimore Police Have a New Excuse to Practice Rounding Up Americans and Shipping Them Off to Detention Centers

BALTIMORE —The Baltimore City Council passed a much-debated new curfew law Monday night that means young people will be required to be off the streets by as early as 9 p.m.

The existing curfew law allows kids under 17 to stay out until 11 p.m. during the week and midnight on weekends, but the new law pushes those times earlier by two hours in some cases. Children under the age of 14 have to be inside by 9 p.m., while teens ages 14-16 have to be inside by 10 p.m. on school nights and 11 p.m. on non-school nights.
There has been criticism that the current curfew law hasn't been enforced. Supporters see the change as a fresh start and said it would help protect children, but others said it would criminalize them.

The City Council chamber erupted in chants of "no new curfews" and boos from the balcony as the same people who rallied against a new curfew law before the council meeting watched as council members passed the legislation by a vote of 13-2.

"There's already a huge amount of police brutality, with adults being targeted, but now police are going to have the green light to do the exact same thing to young people," said opponent Colleen Davidson, a youth organizer of a group called Fist.


Read more: http://www.wbaltv.com/news/baltimore-tightens-juvenile-curfews/26294844#ixzz34IXNvYkD

Several Jail Officers Beat and Strip Naked a Woman Out of Revenge for Misdemeanors

NEW ALBANY, Ind. (WDRB) -- A Louisville attorney says one of her clients was stripped naked and left for hours inside a Floyd County Jail cell and she said she has reason to believe it happens all the time.

Attorney Laura Landenwich represents Tabitha Gentry of New Albany, who was arrested and booked into the Floyd County Jail on March 30. After reviewing surveillance video that captured the actions of staff members during Gentry's incarceration, Landenwich says what happened inside the jail during the next few hours should be discussed in front of a judge.

She reviewed the video with WDRB in her downtown Louisville office on Thursday.

"This is 4:07 a.m., and this is an Indiana State Police officer that picked her up," she explained.

Gentry had been arrested for disorderly conduct and resisting law enforcement.

"Almost immediately upon entering the jail, she's assaulted by four officers. They grab her around the neck, they grab her body," Landenwich said. The video shows officers then taking Gentry to what's called the padded room.

"They hold her down," Landenwich said. "There are two male officers and two female officers and they forceably remove her pants, her shoes, her underwear and her shirt and bra.

"Terrified and humiliated, she's banging on the door asking someone to give her her clothing and someone comes to the door and says, 'If you don't shut up, I'm going to pepper spray you,' and sure enough, they open the door, spray pepper spray into the room and they leave -- and they leave her in there for 40 minutes, naked, in a cell filled with pepper spray."

Landenwich says Gentry was then handcuffed and taken to wash out her eyes.

"She has a blanket draped over her shoulders, she's paraded through the booking area in full view of anyone who happened to be there," Landenwich said.
http://www.wdrb.com/story/25707898/woman-arrested-stripped-naked-plans-to-sue-floyd-co-jail

David Letterman Demands Gun Control, Attacks Second Amendment

The nearly four minute segment was little more than a ploy to attack the Second Amendment, with Letterman setting aside comedy in favor of asking loaded questions designed to make the audience believe that support for gun control is much larger than it actually is.
“Daily in this country, a child or an underaged boy or girl is shot and killed by a gun,” he said. “And then we had the situation in Santa Barbara, California where a fellow was unbalanced and killed people, then killed himself.”
“I certainly thought that Newtown [Sandy Hook] was going to be the landmark, changing, touchstone point in this country where we changed our understanding and awareness about gun ownership.”
Letterman then claimed that gun control would somehow “improve” gun ownership without “eliminating guns,” a common lie considering that gun control ultimately leads to the confiscation of once-legal firearms.
“People are shot and killed each and every day by private handgun ownership,” he said. “You can’t tell me that this isn’t an insoluble problem.”
Letterman also asked how the case for gun control is not “cut and dry.”
“I’m not anti-gun,” he claimed, “but for the love of Christ, when are we going to do something about this nonsense?”
It’s no accident that anti-gun propaganda is becoming more common on TV shows, movies and other forms of mass entertainment.
For one thing, the gun control movement did not originate from the grassroots but is rather a top-down movement bankrolled by powerful politicians such as former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg who want nothing more than to expand government powers at the expense of individual liberties.

 http://www.infowars.com/david-letterman-demands-gun-control-attacks-second-amendment/