Saturday, October 17, 2015

BAUAW NEWSLETTER, SATURDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2015






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Bay Area United Against War Newsletter

Table of Contents:

A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS

B. ARTICLES IN FULL


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A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS


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California Speaking Tour of David Sheen, Oct. 21-29, 2015

The Bullet, the Ballot, and the Boycott: Racism in Israel Today


Oct. 21-29, 2015, independent Canadian-Israeli journalist and filmmaker David Sheen will present the Bullet, the Ballot & the Boycott at venues in California.  He will cover Israeli incitement to racist violence, the focus of his on-the-ground reporting for the past five years.

David will describe how top Israeli political and religious leaders use dehumanizing discourse to inspire vigilante attacks toward Palestinians, Africans and other non-Jews, especially during the 2014 assault on the Gaza Strip.  It will include material that Sheen presented at the Russell Tribunal on Palestine in Brussels, as well as new information never before been made public in English.

David's speaking schedule is as follows.  To make arrangements for David to come to your event or to add the name of your organization as a tour endorser, please call 510-236-4250 or write to us at solidarity@ism-norcal.org.

Wed., Oct. 21
6:00pm
San Jose State University, details to follow
SJSU Students for Justice in Palestine
https://www.facebook.com/sjsusjp

Thu., Oct. 22
TBA
Berkeley, details to follow
Zaytuna University
www.zaytuna.edu

Sun., Oct. 25
2:00pm
Uptown Body & Fender, 401 26th St., Oakland
ISM-NorCal & JVP-Bay Area
510-236-4250, ism-norcal.org
$10 suggested donation


Thu., Oct. 29
TBA
The Markaz, 5998 W. Pico Blvd., Los Angeles
The Markaz & JVP-LA
www.themarkaz.org 310.657.5511


www.ism-norcal.org
ISM Northern California | Supporting Palestinian-led non...
Northern California branch of the Palestinian-led movement committed to resisting the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land using nonviolent, direct-action methods...

View on www.ism-norcal.org
Tour organizer: ISM Support Group in Northern California


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International Committee for Peace, Justice and Dignity

AN EVENING OF SOLIDARITY WITH THE CUBAN PEOPLE

Featuring Kenia Serrano Puig, President of the Cuban Institute of Friendship with the Peoples (ICAP)  

Friday November 13, 7:30pm

East Bay Center for the Performing Arts

339 11th Street, Richmond CA 94801-3105

Doors Open 6:30pm

$10-20 Donation at the Door

(nobody turned away for lack of funds)

Students and children free admission


This will be a unique opportunity to hear from the Cuban perspective about the new stage of U.S.-Cuba relations and the role that the U.S. Cuba solidarity movement can play in ending the U.S. blockade.

PROGRAM:

Keynote Speaker, Kenia Serrano Puig, President of ICAP

Welcome by Gayle McLaughlin, Richmond City Council Member
Dr. Laura Gomez, recently graduated from the Latin America School of Medicine (ELAM)
Leima Martinez, ICAP North America Division
Walter Turner, KPFA Host of Africa Today 

Musical performance by a local group

ICAP is a social organization founded on December 30, 1960 for the purpose of promoting and explaining to the peoples of the world the relations of solidarity that sparked the Cuban Revolution. ICAP is the vehicle to reach around the globe to people who are in solidarity with Cuba. ICAP is that interface that strengthens the network of solidarity, while representing the Cuban people, and delivering a strong message that solidarity not only benefits Cuba but the peoples of the world who are aspiring to promote the idea that a better world is possible for all.

Initiated by the International Committee for Peace, Justice and Dignity

Co-sponsors: Global Exchange, Richmond-Regla Sister City Association, Berkeley-Palma Soriano Sister City Association.


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Commute Kevin Cooper's Death Sentence

Sign the Petition:
http://www.savekevincooper.org/pages/petition.php


Urge Gov. Jerry Brown to commute Kevin Cooper's death sentence. Cooper has always maintained his innocence of the 1983 quadruple murder of which he was convicted. In 2009, five federal judges signed a dissenting opinion warning that the State of California "may be about to execute an innocent man." Having exhausted his appeals in the US courts, Kevin Cooper's lawyers have turned to the Inter American Commission on Human Rights to seek remedy for what they maintain is his wrongful conviction, and the inadequate trial representation, prosecutorial misconduct and racial discrimination which have marked the case. Amnesty International opposes all executions, unconditionally.

"The State of California may be about to execute an innocent man." - Judge William A. Fletcher, 2009 dissenting opinion on Kevin Cooper's case

Kevin Cooper has been on death row in California for more than thirty years.

In 1985, Cooper was convicted of the murder of a family and their house guest in Chino Hills. Sentenced to death, Cooper's trial took place in an atmosphere of racial hatred — for example, an effigy of a monkey in a noose with a sign reading "Hang the N*****!" was hung outside the venue of his preliminary hearing.

Take action to see that Kevin Cooper's death sentence is commuted immediately.

Cooper has consistently maintained his innocence.

Following his trial, five federal judges said: "There is no way to say this politely. The district court failed to provide Cooper a fair hearing."

Since 2004, a dozen federal appellate judges have indicated their doubts about his guilt.

Tell California authorities: The death penalty carries the risk of irrevocable error. Kevin Cooper's sentence must be commuted.

In 2009, Cooper came just eight hours shy of being executed for a crime that he may not have committed. Stand with me today in reminding the state of California that the death penalty is irreversible — Kevin Cooper's sentence must be commuted immediately.

In solidarity,

James Clark
Senior Death Penalty Campaigner
Amnesty International USA

News Updates

  • Death Row Stories
    Kevin Cooper's case will be the subject of a new episode of CNN's "Death Row Stories" airing on Sunday, July 26 at 7 p.m. PDT. The program will be repeated at 10 p.m. PDT. The episode, created by executive producers Robert Redford and Alex Gibney, will explore how Kevin Cooper was framed by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department and District Attorney.Viewers on the east coast can see the program at 10 p.m. EDT and it will be rebroadcast at 1 a.m. EDT on July 27. Viewers in the Central Time zone can see it at 9 p.m. and midnight CDT. Viewers in the Mountain Time zone can see it at 8 p.m. and ll p.m MDT. It will be aired on CNN again during the following week and will also be able to be viewed on CNN's "Death Row Stories" website.
Kevin Cooper: An Innocent Victim of Racist Frame-Up
- from the Fact Sheet at: www.freekevincooper.org
 
Kevin Cooper is an African-American man who was wrongly convicted and sentenced to death in 1985 for the gruesome murders of a white family in Chino Hills, California: Doug and Peggy Ryen and their daughter Jessica and their house- guest Christopher Hughes. The Ryens' 8 year old son Josh, also attacked, was left for dead but survived.

Convicted in an atmosphere of racial hatred in San Bernardino County CA, Kevin Cooper remains under a threat of imminent execution in San Quentin.  He has never received a fair hearing on his claim of innocence.  In a dissenting opinion in 2009, five federal judges of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals signed a 82 page dissenting opinion that begins: "The State of California may be about to execute an innocent man." 565 F.3d 581.

There is significant evidence that exonerates Mr. Cooper and points toward other suspects:

  The coroner who investigated the Ryen murders concluded that the murders took four minutes at most and that the murder weapons were a hatchet, a long knife, an ice pick and perhaps a second knife. How could a single person, in four or fewer minutes, wield three or four weapons, and inflict over 140 wounds on five people, two of whom were adults (including a 200 pound ex-marine) who had loaded weapons near their bedsides?

  The sole surviving victim of the murders, Josh Ryen, told police and hospital staff within hours of the murders that the culprits were "three white men." Josh Ryen repeated this statement in the days following the crimes. When he twice saw Mr. Cooper's picture on TV as the suspected attacker, Josh Ryen said "that's not the man who did it."

  Josh Ryen's description of the killers was corroborated by two witnesses who were driving near the Ryens' home the night of the murders. They reported seeing three white men in a station wagon matching the description of the Ryens' car speeding away from the direction of the Ryens' home.

  These descriptions were corroborated by testimony of several employees and patrons of a bar close to the Ryens' home, who saw three white men enter the bar around midnight the night of the murders, two of whom were covered in blood, and one of whom was wearing coveralls.

  The identity of the real killers was further corroborated by a woman who, shortly after the murders were discovered, alerted the sheriff's department that her boyfriend, a convicted murderer, left blood-spattered coveralls at her home the night of the murders. She also reported that her boyfriend had been wearing a tan t-shirt matching a tan t-shirt with Doug Ryen's blood on it recovered near the bar. She also reported that her boyfriend owned a hatchet matching the one recovered near the scene of the crime, which she noted was missing in the days following the murders; it never reappeared; further, her sister saw that boyfriend and two other white men in a vehicle that could have been the Ryens' car on the night of the murders.

Lacking a motive to ascribe to Mr. Cooper for the crimes, the prosecution claimed that Mr. Cooper, who had earlier walked away from custody at a minimum security prison, stole the Ryens' car to escape to Mexico. But the Ryens had left the keys in both their cars (which were parked in the driveway), so there was no need to kill them to steal their car. The prosecution also claimed that Mr. Cooper needed money, but money and credit cards were found untouched and in plain sight at the murder scene.

The jury in 1985 deliberated for seven days before finding Mr. Cooper guilty. One juror later said that if there had been one less piece of evidence, the jury would not have voted to convict.

The evidence the prosecution presented at trial tying Mr. Cooper to the crime scene has all been discredited…         (Continue reading this document at: http://www.savekevincooper.org/_new_freekevincooperdotorg/TEST/Scripts/DataLibraries/upload/KC_FactSheet_2014.pdf)

     This message from the Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal. July 2015

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Free Albert Woodfox!

On June 8, 2015 a federal judge granted Louisiana prisoner Albert Woodfox unconditional release. Albert's conviction had already been overturned three times - most recently in 2013 - yet every time the state has appealed.

Today, Albert is still behind bars after spending four decades in cruel, unjust solitary confinement. He believes that he and fellow prisoners, Herman Wallace and Robert King, were first placed in solitary confinement in retaliation for their activism. All three men were members of the Black Panther Party. Together, they came to be known as the Angola 3.

It is time for the State of Louisiana to stop standing in the way of justice. Call on Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal to ensure Albert's cruel and unjust confinement is not his legacy. Learn more

http://act.amnestyusa.org/ea-action/action?ea.client.id=1839&ea.campaign.id=35593&ea.tracking.id=Country_USA~MessagingCategory_PrisonersandPeopleatRisk&ac=W1506EAIAR2&ea.url.id=414689&forwarded=true

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Amnesty for all those arrested demanding justice for Freddie Gray!

 

Amnesty for ALL those arrested
demanding justice for Freddie Gray!

Sign and distribute the petition to drop the charges!
Spread this effort with #Amnesty4Baltimore

"A riot is the language of the unheard"
— Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

An estimated 300 people have been arrested in Baltimore in the last two weeks. Many have been brutalized, beaten and pepper-sprayed by police in the streets, and held for days in inhumane conditions. Those arrested include journalists, medics and legal observers.

One individual arrested for property destruction of a police vehicle is now facing life in prison and is being held on $500,000 bail. That's $150,000 more than the officer charged with the murder of Freddie Gray.  

The legal system has made it clear that they care more about broken windows than broken necks; more about a CVS than the lives of Baltimore's Black residents.

They showed no hesitation in arresting Baltimore's protesters and rebels, and sending in the National Guard, but took 19 days to put a single one of the killer cops in handcuffs. This was the outrageous double standard that led to the Baltimore Uprising.

 Sign the petition to drop the charges on all who have been arrested.

Petition to Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake

Download PDF of Petition 

http://www.answercoalition.org/amnesty_for_all_those_arrested_demanding_justice_for_freddie_gray?utm_campaign=baltimore_amn1&utm_medium=email&utm_source=answercoalition

Mayor Stephanie C. Rawlings-Blake
City Hall, Room 250,
100 North Holliday St.,
Baltimore, MD 21202

Dear Mayor Rawlings-Blake:

I stand in solidarity with those in Baltimore who are demanding that all charges be dropped against those who rose up against racism, police brutality, oppressive social conditions and delay of justice in the case of Freddie Gray. The whole world now recognizes that were it not for this powerful grassroots movement, in all its forms, there would be no indictment.

It is an outrage that peaceful protesters have been brutalized, beaten and pepper-sprayed by police in the streets, and held for days in inhumane conditions. Those arrested include journalists and legal observers.

Even the youth who are charged with property destruction and looting should be given an amnesty. There is no reason a teenager -- provoked by racists and justifiably angry -- should be facing life in prison for breaking the windows of a police car.

The City of Baltimore should work to rectify the conditions that led to this Uprising, rather than criminalizing those who took action in response to those conditions. Drop the charges now!

Sincerely,
[add your name below]

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CANCEL ALL STUDENT DEBT!

Sign the Petition:

http://cancelallstudentdebt.com/?code=kos


Dear President Obama, Senators, and Members of Congress:


Americans now owe $1.3 trillion in student debt. Eighty-six percent of that money is owed to the United States government. This is a crushing burden for more than 40 million Americans and their families.

I urge you to take immediate action to forgive all student debt, public and private.

American Federation of Teachers
Campaign for America's Future
Courage Campaign
Daily Kos
Democracy for America
LeftAction
Project Springboard
RH Reality Check
RootsAction
Student Debt Crisis
The Nation
Working Families



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MUMIA'S FINAL APPEAL FOR HEALTHCARE DENIED!

Last night Mumia got notice that the final appeal of his PA Department of Corrections grievance was denied. Listen to his reaction here.

This denial comes on top of the magistrate Judge’s proposal to deny Mumia's right to treatment last week.

Remember-- one of the reasons the Judge gave was her claim that Mumia had not "exhausted his administrative remedies" or received a final denial of his request for care. Now he has received that denial.

We know that withholding Mumia’s care is immoral and illegal. We are confident that we will win this battle in court- but we can’t do it alone.





We have 3 days left to raise $2,948 to support Mumia’s legal team in securing his right to hepatitis C treatment!

If you have already joined us, we’re inviting you to ask one friend to match your gift. We need about 50 more freedom fighters to join us to reach our goal— and we want you to make that happen with us!

If you haven’t given yet- now is the time to make a contribution for Mumia. Will you join us?

Health care is a human right- for Mumia, and for all prisoners. Let's prove it.‪ #freemumia #fight4mumia

Reply directly to this email to respond to the campaign owner, Prison Radio . Visit the campaign page to view all comments and updates for this project.

Help spread the word about the campaign!
PRISONRADIO.ORG

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Campaign to Free Lorenzo Johnson
 
Updates from the New "Team Free Lorenzo Johnson":
Thank you all for your relentless effort in the fight against wrongful convictions and your determination to stand behind Lorenzo.

To garner even more support for Lorenzo Johnson, we have been hard at work updating the website and developing an even more formidable and dedicated team. Please take a moment to visit the new site here.

During the month of July, Lorenzo wrote two new articles for The Huffington Post titled "When Prosecutors Deny Justice for the Innocent," and "Hurry Up and Wait for Justice: The Struggle of Innocent Prisoners." In these articles, Lorenzo discusses the flaws in the criminal justice system, which he deems is a "serious problem in this country."

Lastly, Lorenzo has a message to you all.

A Letter from Lorenzo:

July 23, 2015
Dauphin County Prison
Harrisburg, PA

Dear Supporters,

I hope all is well with everyone and your families. As for myself, I'm still on my journey in pursuit of my vindication. Sorry for my website being shut down for a couple of weeks. It was being transferred to a new provider and management. I'm back and will do my best to keep everything up to speed with what's taking place.

I would like to thank ALL of my loyal supporters in the U.S. and in the MANY different counties that have signed on to support my innocence. Thanks for all of the letters, emails, photos, etc. Like I always say, I get energy to carry on and inspiration hearing form you, please stay engaged in my struggle.

As of this moment, nothing has changed, but – the continued delay tactics are constantly being used by my prosecutor, Deputy Attorney General William Stoycos. With the mounting of evidence that supports my innocence and police and prosecution misconduct claims that is steadily piling up, you would think that I would be having a couple of evidentiary hearings on my actual innocence appeal that have been pending since August 5, 2013.

At the time of this writing, I've been moved from SCI-Mahanoy to Dauphin County Prison and locked down for 23 hours and 40 minutes a day. In the 20 minutes I get to come out, I get to take a shower and make a short call. Prosecutor Stoycos had me moved so I can be a witness in his attempt to have my codefendant Corey Walker's attorney removed from representing him. How dare he call into question an attorney who is seeking justice for her client, when prosecutor Stoycos himself violated multiple constitutional rights of mine and Mr. Walker, that led to us being in prison for 20 years and counting.

Prosecutor Stoycos is continuously abusing his power and his endless resources he has at his disposal. He is not tough on crime, he's tough on Innocent Prisoners. Prosecutor Stoycos is doing everything in his power to prevent justice from taking place. I encourage everyone to continue to speak out against my nightmare, invite others to get involved by going to my website and signing my Freedom Petition and whatever else they're willing to do.

On a positive note, I just enrolled in warehouse management trade and started on July 13th. Unfortunately, you're only allowed to miss a couple of days and Prosecutor Stoycos had me temporarily transferred on July 14th … It's extremely hard on Lifers to get into these trades due to the fact that Lifers are placed at the back of the list of ALL vocational classes. I try to further my education every chance I get, so when I do come home, I will be certified in different work.

The month of the hearing has come and left, without me being brought to the courthouse … I'm one of MANY innocent prisoners who endures this non-stop madness in our pursuit of Justice and Freedom. Now that my webpage is almost caught up to speed, I promise prompt updates and as everyone knows that contacted me directly, I personally reply to those in the states and out of the country. For those who can make a financial contribution, everything counts. Take care and let's continue to fight until we achieve Freedom, Justice, and Equality for all innocent prisoners.

"The Pain Within"

Free the Innocent
Lorenzo "Cat" Johnson

[Note: Lorenzo has since been transferred back to SCI Mahanoy and can be reached at his usual address.]

Thank you all for reading this message and please take the time to visit the new website and contribute to Lorenzo's campaign for freedom!

Write: Lorenzo Johnson
            DF 1036
            SCI Mahanoy
            301 Morea Rd.
            Frackville, PA 17932

 Email: Through JPay using the code:
              Lorenzo Johnson DF 1036 PA DOC
                                     or
              Directly at LorenzoJohnson17932@gmail.com

Have a wonderful day!
- The Team to Free Lorenzo Johnson


freelorenzojohnson.org

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 Join the Fight to Free Rev. Pinkney!

Click HERE to view in browser

http://www.iacenter.org/prisoners/freepinkney-1-28-15/


On December 15, 2014 the Rev. Edward Pinkney of Benton Harbor, Michigan was thrown into prison for 2.5 to 10 years. This 66-year-old leading African American activist was tried and convicted in front of an all-white jury and racist white judge and prosecutor for supposedly altering 5 dates on a recall petition against the mayor of Benton Harbor.

The prosecutor, with the judge's approval, repeatedly told the jury "you don't need evidence to convict Mr. Pinkney." And ABSOLUTELY NO EVIDENCE WAS EVER PRESENTED THAT TIED REV. PINKNEY TO THE 'ALTERED' PETITIONS. Rev. Pinkney was immediately led away in handcuffs and thrown into Jackson Prison.

This is an outrageous charge. It is an outrageous conviction. It is an even more outrageous sentence! It must be appealed.

With your help supporters need to raise $20,000 for Rev. Pinkney's appeal.

Checks can be made out to BANCO (Black Autonomy Network Community Organization). This is the organization founded by Rev. Pinkney.  Mail them to: Mrs. Dorothy Pinkney, 1940 Union Street, Benton Harbor, MI 49022.

Donations can be accepted on-line at bhbanco.org – press the donate button.

For information on the decade long campaign to destroy Rev. Pinkney go to bhbanco.org and workers.org(search "Pinkney").

We urge your support to the efforts to Free Rev. Pinkney!Ramsey Clark – Former U.S. attorney general,
Cynthia McKinney – Former member of U.S. Congress,
Lynne Stewart – Former political prisoner and human rights attorney
Ralph Poynter – New Abolitionist Movement,
Abayomi Azikiwe – Editor, Pan-African News Wire<
Larry Holmes – Peoples Power Assembly,
David Sole – Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice
Sara Flounders – International Action Center

MESSAGE FROM REV. PINKNEY

I am now in Marquette prison over 15 hours from wife and family, sitting in prison for a crime that was never committed. Judge Schrock and Mike Sepic both admitted there was no evidence against me but now I sit in prison facing 30 months. Schrock actually stated that he wanted to make an example out of me. (to scare Benton Harbor residents even more...) ONLY IN AMERICA. I now have an army to help fight Berrien County. When I arrived at Jackson state prison on Dec. 15, I met several hundred people from Detroit, Flint, Kalamazoo, and Grand Rapids. Some people recognized me. There was an outstanding amount of support given by the prison inmates. When I was transported to Marquette Prison it took 2 days. The prisoners knew who I was. One of the guards looked me up on the internet and said, "who would believe Berrien County is this racist."

Background to Campaign to free Rev. Pinkney

Michigan political prisoner the Rev. Edward Pinkney is a victim of racist injustice. He was sentenced to 30 months to 10 years for supposedly changing the dates on 5 signatures on a petition to recall Benton Harbor Mayor James Hightower.

No material or circumstantial evidence was presented at the trial that would implicate Pinkney in the purported5 felonies. Many believe that Pinkney, a Berrien County activist and leader of the Black Autonomy Network Community Organization (BANCO), is being punished by local authorities for opposing the corporate plans of Whirlpool Corp, headquartered in Benton Harbor, Michigan.

In 2012, Pinkney and BANCO led an "Occupy the PGA [Professional Golfers' Association of America]" demonstration against a world-renowned golf tournament held at the newly created Jack Nicklaus Signature Golf Course on the shoreline of Lake Michigan. The course was carved out of Jean Klock Park, which had been donated to the city of Benton Harbor decades ago.

Berrien County officials were determined to defeat the recall campaign against Mayor Hightower, who opposed a program that would have taxed local corporations in order to create jobs and improve conditions in Benton Harbor, a majority African-American municipality. Like other Michigan cities, it has been devastated by widespread poverty and unemployment.

The Benton Harbor corporate power structure has used similar fraudulent charges to stop past efforts to recall or vote out of office the racist white officials, from mayor, judges, prosecutors in a majority Black city. Rev Pinkney who always quotes scripture, as many Christian ministers do, was even convicted for quoting scripture in a newspaper column. This outrageous conviction was overturned on appeal. We must do this again!

To sign the petition in support of the Rev. Edward Pinkney, log on to: tinyurl.com/ps4lwyn.

Contributions for Rev. Pinkney's defense can be sent to BANCO at Mrs Dorothy Pinkney, 1940 Union St., Benton Harbor, MI 49022

Or you can donate on-line at bhbanco.org.

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COURAGE TO RESIST

 http://couragetoresist.org/

New Action--write letters to DoD officials requesting clemency for Chelsea!

Secretary of the Army John McHugh

President Obama has delegated review of Chelsea Manning's clemency appeal to individuals within the Department of Defense.

Please write them to express your support for heroic WikiLeaks' whistle-blower former US Army intelligence analyst PFC Chelsea Manning's release from military prison.

It is important that each of these authorities realize the wide support that Chelsea (formerly Bradley) Manning enjoys worldwide. They need to be reminded that millions understand that Manning is a political prisoner, imprisoned for following her conscience. While it is highly unlikely that any of these individuals would independently move to release Manning, a reduction in Manning's outrageous 35-year prison sentence is a possibility at this stage.

Take action TODAY – Write letters supporting Chelsea's clemency petition to the following DoD authorities:

Secretary of the Army John McHugh

101 Army Pentagon

Washington, DC 20310-0101

The Judge Advocate General

2200 Army Pentagon

Washington, DC 20310-2200

Army Clemency and Parole Board

251 18th St, Suite 385

Arlington, VA 22202-3532

Directorate of Inmate Administration

Attn: Boards Branch

U.S. Disciplinary Barracks

1301 N. Warehouse Road

Fort Leavenworth, KS 66027-2304

Suggestions for letters send to DoD officials:

The letter should focus on your support for Chelsea Manning, and especially why you believe justice will be served if Chelsea Manning's sentence is reduced.  The letter should NOT be anti-military as this will be unlikely to help.

A suggested message: "Chelsea Manning has been punished enough for violating military regulations in the course of being true to her conscience.  I urge you to use your authorityto reduce Pvt. Manning's sentence to time served."  Beyond that general message, feel free to personalize the details as to why you believe Chelsea deserves clemency.

Consider composing your letter on personalized letterhead -you can create this yourself (here are templates and some tips for doing that).

A comment on this post will NOT be seen by DoD authorities–please send your letters to the addresses above

This clemency petition is separate from Chelsea Manning's upcoming appeal before the US Army Court of Criminal Appeals next year, where Manning's new attorney Nancy Hollander will have an opportunity to highlight the prosecution's—and the trial judge's—misconduct during last year's trial at Ft. Meade, Maryland.

Help us continue to cover 100% of Chelsea's legal fees at this critical stage!


Courage to Resist
484 Lake Park Ave. #41
Oakland, CA 94610
510-488-3559
couragetoresist.org


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B. ARTICLES IN FULL


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1) For-Profit Colleges Accused of Fraud Still Receive U.S. Funds
By

When the Obama administration agreed this summer to erase the federal loan debt of some former students at Corinthian Colleges, a for-profit school that filed for bankruptcy in the face of charges of widespread fraud, education officials promised to “protect students from abusive colleges and safeguard the interests of taxpayers.”

But the Education Department, despite a crackdown against what it calls “bad actors,” continues to hand over tens of millions of dollars every month to other for-profit schools that have been accused of predatory behavior, substandard practices or illegal activity by its own officials or state attorneys general across the country.Consider the Education Management Corporation, which runs 110 schools in the United States for chefs, artists and other trades. It has been investigated or sued in recent years by prosecutors in at least 12 states. The Justice Department has accused the company of illegally using incentives to pay its recruiters. And last year, investors filed a class-action lawsuit, contending that the company engaged in deceptive enrollment practices and manipulated federal student loan and grant programs.

Education Management nonetheless received more than $1.25 billion in federal money over the last school year.

The career training and for-profit college industry has been accused in recent years of preying on the poor, veterans and minorities by charging exorbitant fees for degrees that mostly fail to deliver promised skills and jobs.

Despite stepped-up scrutiny, hundreds of schools that have failed regulatory standards or been accused of violating legal statutes are still hauling in billions of dollars of government funds. They include tiny beauty schools with staggering loan default rates and online law schools with dismal graduation records and no bar association accreditation. Without government funds, which account for the overwhelming bulk of revenue, few of these institutions could attract students or stay in business.

The continuing flow of money illustrates the quandary facing federal education officials. On one hand, they have moved forcefully to try to protect taxpayer funds and prevent students from falling deeply into debt without anything to show for it. On the other, they must avoid running roughshod over private for-profit schools that have not been found guilty of wrongdoing. Agency officials point out that they cannot withhold money based on accusations, but must have proof of misconduct.

For example, Education Management, which says it is cooperating with prosecutors, says it “strongly disagrees” with the Justice Department allegations.

Regulators are caught between an industry that says it is being unfairly demonized by opponents and critics who complain not enough is being done to prevent fraud and abuse of vulnerable students.

A Quandary

“For-profits successfully serve a lot of students, and the department has been very sensitive to having all students suffer for what may only affect some students in some programs,” said Kevin Kinser, an associate professor who studies for-profit colleges at the State University of New York at Albany. “So they are reluctant to throw the baby out with the bath water.”

Mr. Kinser pointed out that the Education Department had little flexibility under the law when it came to cutting off federal student loan and grant money to potential abusers. “There are individual triggers in place for financial viability, institutional integrity, et cetera,” he said, “but no three-strikes-and-you’re-out rule.”

Education officials say they have clamped down on many for-profit schools, restricting their ability to expand their programs or the number of campuses, capping the number of students eligible for student loans, or requiring schools like Education Management to post a letter of credit to gain access to federal student loans and grants. The letter is meant to protect students and taxpayers if the company is unable to cover federal student-aid liabilities.

“What’s clear to all of us is that the best way to solve this problem is at the front end and not to let bad schools operate,” said Ted Mitchell, the under secretary of education. The agency’s “more aggressive stance,” he said, helped contribute to an 18 percent drop in enrollment at for-profits from 2011 to 2013.

Still, critics say that even schools with egregious violations have become adept at exploiting loopholes, sidestepping rules or taking advantage of yearslong appeals processes. Companies with several campuses can pool graduation, financial, enrollment, staffing and other statistics to mask weak performers, experts say.

“Bright-line standards are good, but they can also be managed,” said Ben Miller, senior director for postsecondary education at the Center for American Progress, a liberal research and advocacy group. “It’s why almost nobody gets caught. The big schools know how to work the numbers to avoid failing.”

For example, the government can withhold student loan payments when a college’s default rate surpasses 30 percent three years in row — a signal that a school has a high dropout rate or that its students are not making sufficient income to pay back their loans. But several schools have figured out how to lower their rates by getting students temporary deferments or forbearances so they fall outside the three-year window.

Nearly 100 schools have a student loan default rate that exceeds 30 percent. Last year, they received $116 million in federal aid from the Education Department.

A new study by Adam Looney, of the Treasury Department, and Constantine Yannelis at Stanford University, found that since 2000, “most of the increase in default is associated with the rise in the number of borrowers at for-profit schools.” For-profit schools enroll about 12 percent of the nation’s college students, yet they account for nearly half of student loan defaults.

Finding Problems

ITT Educational Services, which has about 138 campuses and 47,000 students, has been investigated or sued by 19 states, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the Justice Department. Two of its campuses also failed to meet the Education Department’s standards for financial responsibility.

Nonetheless, campuses flagged for problems by the department received more than $592 million in the 12-month period that ended June 30.

In an email, Nicole Elam, a spokeswoman for ITT, wrote: “To date, not a single lawsuit has been filed by the multistate group of attorneys general naming ITT Tech.” In addition, ITT has called the S.E.C.’s charges “unfounded” and the consumer protection bureau’s case “unjustified.”

“ITT Tech does help prospective students make informed decisions about enrollment through the disclosure of program cost, graduation and job placement rates, graduate salaries and loan debt,” Ms. Elam said.

In recent years, more than two dozen companies that run for-profit colleges have been investigated or sued by state prosecutors. To handle the load, 37 state attorneys general have teamed up to form a working group. Together, the 152 schools under investigation received about $8.1 billion in federal student loan and grant payments last fiscal year, according to a detailed analysis by Mr. Miller for The New York Times, using data provided by the Education Department.

One of those is Alta Colleges, partly owned by the Boston private equity firm Housatonic Partners. Alta, which operates campuses and an online division in several states, is being sued by the Illinois attorney general, who claims the colleges engaged in “deceptive, unfair and abusive practices in the marketing and selling of their criminal justice program,” a three-year degree that costs $75,000, according to the complaint.

Students were promised they would be primed for careers as police officers, sheriffs, corrections officers and FBI agents, but only 3.8 percent of graduates were actually employed as sworn law enforcement officers or correctional officers, the lawsuit states. The two most common jobs for graduates of the criminal justice program were as security guards or in retailing, positions that typically require only a high school or equivalency diploma. Alta schools received more than $104 million in federal aid in the last school year.

Alta filed papers in court denying the allegations. The company did not return several phone calls seeking comment.

Other schools under investigation complain they are the target of a witch hunt.

Chris Hardman, senior vice president for communications at Education Management, said that the company was cooperating with prosecutors but that many of the investigations related to past recruiting practices.

“We are dedicated to providing the opportunity for an education that, were it not for schools like ours, many of our students might never achieve,” Mr. Hardman said.

Other schools, including Lincoln Technical Institute and Kaplan Career Institute in Massachusetts, have negotiated settlements with state prosecutors.

Kaplan, which no longer runs any schools in Massachusetts, paid nearly $1.4 million, mostly used to pay down student loans, after being accused of misleading students with false information about its program and job placement and using “harassing sales tactics.”

The parent company, Kaplan Higher Education settled another suit this year with the Justice Department, for $1.3 million, after being accused of employing unqualified instructors to teach its medical assistant courses in Texas.

Neither Kaplan nor Lincoln admitted any wrongdoing.Kaplan’s schools, including its online California law school, where only one in five students graduates, received $776.3 million worth of federal student loans and grants last year. Because it lacks bar association accreditation, most graduates outside California are not allowed to take a bar exam.

“These schools exist on the back of U.S. taxpayers,” Maura Healey, the Massachusetts attorney general, said. “It’s time to turn off the spigot of federal student loan that are flowing into these for-profit colleges.”

“They absolutely have the authority today” to cut off funds, Ms. Healey said, arguing that the federal government could rely on findings by the state attorneys general, among other evidence of abuse.

So far more than 3,000 former Corinthian students have successfully petitioned the Education Department to erase their college loan debt because their school closed. Thousands more from Corinthian have asked for relief.

Education officials met with advocates at the White House last month, to discuss whether the agency could act more quickly to cut off access to federal funds when there were warning signs of bad behavior, according to a participant.

The Defense Department recently barred the University of Phoenix, one of the largest for-profit schools, from participating in its tuition assistance program for active-duty troops or from recruiting on military bases. The Pentagon cited investigations begun by the Federal Trade Commission and the California attorney general.

Although for-profit schools are prohibited from receiving more than 90 percent of their revenue from the federal government, military benefits such as the Pentagon’s tuition-assistance program and the G.I. Bill are not counted toward that sum, a loophole that has infuriated critics.

David Halperin, a Washington lawyer who tracks investigations against for-profits, has taken federal officials to task for not moving more aggressively against schools with long records of complaints.

“The Department of Education has declared Corinthian Colleges a disaster area in need of a big taxpayer bailout, yet the department continues to send billions of dollars to other for-profit colleges that are deceiving and abusing students in the same ways Corinthian did,” he said.

Warning Signs

A formal investigation is only one of the serious warning signs that a college may be engaging in abusive practices or financial shenanigans, prosecutors, officials and advocates say.

There are 98 for-profit schools on the Education Department’s financial responsibility watch list, which Mr. Mitchell, the under secretary, has described as a “caution light.” They received roughly $600 million in the last year.

And 35 for-profit schools have been subjected to the department’s most stringent financial sanctions, which limit access to federal money in advance. Inclusion on this list can be another signal that there are regulatory problems, sometimes serious, relating to accreditation, financial statements and audits, liabilities or denial of certifications. Last year, these schools received more than $15 million.

Education advocates have also accused the Education Department of not more aggressively policing for-profit schools that convert to nonprofits as a way of sidestepping federal regulations. A report released last week by The Century Foundation concluded: “The owners of some for-profit institutions have sought to switch their schools to nonprofit status, freeing them from the regulatory burdens of for-profit colleges, while continuing to reap the personal financial benefits of for-profit ownership.”

Mr. Mitchell said that a new regulation that went into effect this summer would add a powerful weapon to the agency’s arsenal of sanctions. Known as the gainful employment rule, it measures whether graduates of for-profit vocational programs as well as nondegree programs at community colleges earn enough to pay off student loans.

The Obama administration, which sent officials on the road last month to promote his plan for free community college, has estimated that 99 percent of the 1,400 programs likely to fail under the new rules are run by for-profit schools. The industry has fiercely fought this new regulation; Democrats and Republicans in Congress have introduced legislation to roll it back.

Mr. Mitchell also criticized state accreditation agencies for not more aggressively monitoring substandard institutions.

“The fact that Corinthian was accredited through the day of its bankruptcy,” Mr. Mitchell said, “shows that there’s a lot of work to do through quality assurance.”



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2) A.C.L.U. Says Complaints Show Border Patrol ‘Impunity’
By
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/15/us/aclu-accuses-border-patrol-of-underreporting-civil-rights-complaints.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

TUCSON — The federal checkpoints on highways near the Mexican border, with trained dogs and expensive scanning equipment, are supposed to stop drugs and immigrants without legal status from heading north. But newly released complaints against United States Customs and Border Protection paint a disquieting portrait of the interactions between agents and many of those they stopped and searched.Last year, in southeastern Arizona, a military veteran said his children shuddered with fear in the back seat as agents repeatedly asked him if the children were really his. A woman at a checkpoint between Phoenix and Tucson said an agent threatened to use a stun gun on her brother in 2012 after he asked why their vehicle was being searched. And at a California checkpoint in 2013, a man said an agent approached him, hand on his holstered weapon, and demanded: “How would you like to have a gun pointed at your face?”

The accounts were culled from nearly 6,000 pages of complaints, arrest statistics and other records released in recent months to the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona by Customs and Border Protection’s overseer, the Department of Homeland Security, after the A.C.L.U. sued the department for access. Collectively, the documents, detailing encounters between motorists and border agents from January 2011 to August 2014, portray an agency whose fractured oversight system has enabled at least some agents working along the southern border to stretch the limits of law and professional courtesy while rarely facing meaningful consequences.

Among the 142 complaints obtained by the A.C.L.U., only one seems to have resulted in disciplinary action: An agent received a one-day suspension for unjustifiably stopping a vehicle, apparently driven by the son of a retired Border Patrol agent.

James Lyall, an A.C.L.U. lawyer dedicated to the border, said the records not only confirmed the types of stories his office regularly hears from border residents, but also suggested that Customs and Border Protection has underreported the number of civil rights complaints it has received. For example, in reports to Congress for the 2012 fiscal year, oversight agencies listed three complaints accusing agents of violating the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures, according to an A.C.L.U. report. At the same time, the records the A.C.L.U. received include 81 such accusations filed during the same period against agents assigned to the Border Patrol’s Tucson and Yuma sectors, or only two of its 20 regional divisions along the southern and northern borders.

“C.B.P.’s own records paint a disturbing picture of lawlessness and impunity, in which the agency continually operates without any regard for accepted best practices, and agents commit widespread abuses knowing they won’t be held accountable,” Mr. Lyall said.

Agency officials declined to respond to requests for comment on the complaints, directing reporters to remarks from Commissioner R. Gil Kerlikowske that highlight his effort to make openness and accountability top priorities when he took over the agency in March 2014. One agency official held up Friday’s arraignment of a Border Patrol agent, Lonnie Swartz, on the cross-border killing of a 16-year-old boy, José Antonio Elena Rodriguez, as an example that no one is above the law.

But civil rights lawyers, along with members of Congress from border towns in Texas and Arizona, have long argued that Customs and Border Protection works according to its own rules, resisting calls for greater transparency and accountability.

As evidence, they note that since Jan. 1, 2010, 33 people have died in encounters with border and customs agents but that so far, Agent Swartz has been the only one to face federal criminal charges. (He pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder in Federal District Court here on Friday.)

Many of the families of those who were killed have also complained that the agency has fought hard to keep the names of agents implicated in the killings under seal; José Antonio’s family had to sue to learn Agent Swartz’s identity.

The agency has also been slow to investigate when shots are fired but no injuries are confirmed, and failed to track the number of stops at checkpoints or by roving patrols unless the stops result in arrests. A 2013 report by the nonprofit Police Executive Research Forum said such “no harm, no foul” procedures can lead to a “tacit approval of bad practices.”

Mr. Kerlikowske, in response, has convened panels and pushed for changes in the way the agency does business.

In particular, he has championed the recommendations released in June by the Integrity Advisory Panel, of which Commissioner William J. Bratton of New York is vice chairman. Its recommendations for the agency ranged from basic — “emphasize that its overarching responsibility is to preserve human life” — to practical, such as enforcing requirements that all uniformed personnel wear visible name tags at all times and improving Spanish-language abilities at its call centers, where many of the abuse complaints are logged.

“I am taking steps to make transparency and accountability hallmarks of my tenure at C.B.P.,” Mr. Kerlikowske said in April during a speech at the Brookings Institution in Washington. “The public’s trust in us depends on it.”

This month he announced the latest of several policy updates, calling for proper safekeeping of the personal effects of migrants apprehended while illegally crossing the border, adequate standards of hygiene and temperature in holding cells, and specific language on gender identity, which did not exist.

On Tuesday, the agency reported that use-of-force incidents dropped by 26 percent over the past fiscal year — to 768 in the 2015 fiscal year, which ended Sept. 30, from 1,037 in the 2014 fiscal year. There were 28 incidents involving firearms in the 2015 fiscal year, one fewer than in the previous fiscal year.

In a statement, Commissioner Kerlikowske said that he was “encouraged by the progress,” but that “more can be done.”

Civil rights advocates and elected officials say the agency still has a long way to go.

The civil rights complaints filed by motorists at checkpoints and roving patrols in Arizona and southeastern California that are part of the A.C.L.U. records — as well as hundreds of other cases found in complaint records obtained independently by The New York Times — are full of accusations of lengthy detentions and damaged property, such as ripped carpets and seats as agents presumably searched for drugs.

Often, drivers claimed that the agents’ aggressive reactions were prompted by a simple question: Why had their vehicle been picked for an inspection?

Representative Raúl M. Grijalva, Democrat of Arizona, whose district includes border communities from Nogales to Yuma, said his office has received numerous such complaints from constituents, who speak of “being frustrated” and “losing confidence” over the Border Patrol’s “justifications and judgment.”

“Citizens, permanent legal residents, people who have lived in the borderlands for generations — that’s who’s making these complaints,” said Mr. Grijalva, who added that he also had his car searched this year at a checkpoint south of Tucson. “People make the complaints, but their complaints go nowhere. There’s no acknowledgment, absolutely no response.”

Many of the complaints that he and the A.C.L.U. have received make allegations of ethnic profiling. One, by a lawyer for the City of Nogales, says, “How many non-Hispanic-looking persons get subjected to non-immigration questions? How many declarations of U.S. citizenship by non-Hispanic-looking persons are subject to further questioning? The tired excuse of ‘the dog alerted’ has worn incredibly thin as a reason to search Hispanics.”

Agents rely heavily on drug-sniffing dogs to inspect the thousands of cars that go through the Border Patrol’s busiest checkpoints, tollbooth-like way stations near the border. But the agency does not seem to keep track of when dogs alert, how often they alert and how often their alerts are wrong. It records an alert only when it results in an arrest.

Jane Bambauer, an associate professor of law at the University of Arizona, said this type of detailed record-keeping was “critical to accountability” because it would allow the agency to assess if a program is working or not.

“If they’re only reporting when their hunches turn out to be correct, we can’t say if their hunches have been reliable,” said Ms. Bambauer, who joined the A.C.L.U. in its public records request, which the Homeland Security Department ignored until it was sued. “What you end up with is a pretty aggressive agency that doesn’t know how to measure the effectiveness of all the power that it wields.”


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3) Officials in Texas Grapple With Police Decision to Use Taser on City Council Member
By KATIE ROGERS

Officials in a small Texas town are questioning a decision by the police to use a Taser on a member of the City Council before charging him with resisting arrest.

The City Council in Prairie View, Tex., will hold a special session on Thursday, asking for an update from the police about why Jonathan L. Miller, a 26-year-old councilman, was Tasered last Thursday after he approached officers who had detained three of Mr. Miller’s friends outside his home.

In a police video of the encounter, a female officer can be heard saying to Mr. Miller as he approached, “There’s been drug activity — little girls and little guys in the car doing whatever.”

In the video, Mr. Miller tries to explain to the officer that he and his friends were practicing a march, and that they were in town to celebrate Prairie View A&M University, their alma mater. The female officer, who is black, says that the situation is fine and asks Mr. Miller to back away.

One of Mr. Miller’s friends tells the officer that he is a City Council member. “I know who he is,” the female officer responds.

In a confrontation that intensifies over about three minutes, Mr. Miller is told to back away from the officers repeatedly but refuses.

“You’re always starting problems, so go back over there,” another officer tells him. When Mr. Miller refuses to move, that officer is at first told by the female officer not to use the Taser.

“He’s going to have to tase you,” the female officer says, though Mr. Miller was not combative. “You’re not doing like you’re supposed to do.”

“I told you to back off,” the male officer says. “You did not listen.”

“I live here,” Mr. Miller repeatedly says. “What’s the issue? What did I do?”

Calls to Mr. Miller and Prairie View’s mayor, Frank D. Jackson, were not returned and messages were not immediately answered on Tuesday. In a video posted shortly after his release from custody, Mr. Miller said that he was charged with interfering with public duties and for resisting arrest. Mr. Miller was the only person taken into custody during the encounter, the police said Tuesday.

Tasers are frequently used by police officers to disarm their targets, but activists worry about the weapon’s prevalence. Taser International, the manufacturer of the electrical weapons, said in May that more than 18,000 law enforcement agencies had purchased the devices, which are used about 900 times a day.

On Monday, Larry Johnson, the chief of Prairie View Police, said that the video of the episode had been turned over to the Waller County district attorney, and that the Taser had been used according to policy, The Associated Press reported.

Prairie View, a small college town where more than 80 percent of residents are black, has been under heightened scrutiny since this summer, when Sandra Bland, a black woman, was found dead in her jail cell days after she was arrested during a traffic stop in the town. Dashboard camera video taken from that episode showed the white state trooper who arrested her threatening her with a Taser.

“I will light you up,” the trooper, Brian T. Encinia, told Ms. Bland, who was later taken into custody after being pushed to the ground.




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4) Volkswagen Told to Recall 2.4 Million Vehicles in Germany
By MELISSA EDDY

BERLIN — Germany’s automobile regulator on Thursday ordered Volkswagen to recall 2.4 million vehicles with diesel motors carrying software intended to manipulate emissions test results.

It is the first government-ordered recall anywhere since Volkswagen admitted the deception last month and said it affected 11 million cars worldwide. The government rejected the automaker’s proposal to repair the vehicles as insufficient.

Germany’s transportation minister, Alexander Dobrindt, said that the mandatory recall would begin in 2016 and would be overseen by the regulator, the Federal Motor Transport Authority, known by its German initials K.B.A.

“The K.B.A. believes that the software used in the diesel engines constitutes an illegal defeat device,” Mr. Dobrindt said. “The authority has demanded that Volkswagen remove the software and take all steps necessary to ensure that the emissions regulations are met.”The crackdown by the German government deals a blow to the company in one of its most important markets.

Volkswagen said that it had received a response from the transport authority early on Thursday, but that it needed time to review it before commenting on it.

The German automaker has been under increasing pressure since admitting last month to American environmental authorities that it had installed a line of code in software in its diesel engines intended to manipulate the results of emissions testing.

The transport authority last week demanded that Volkswagen submit a proposal to remedy the problem. Although the company had offered fixes, the regulator instead ordered the recall.

In its proposal, Volkswagen had offered to update software on vehicles with 1.2- and 2-liter diesel engines starting next year to override the code that American environmental authorities discovered limited the amount of noxious gasses emitted during lab testing, but not during normal driving.

Mr. Dobrindt said the regulator believed the software was also active in cars in Germany and expected the company to present a fix for the 2-liter motors, with the solutions for the 1.2- and 1.6-liter engines to be presented by the end of November.

The 1.6-liter models will most likely require additional hardware to remedy the problem that would not be ready until September of next year, Mr. Dobrindt said.

This week, Volkswagen said that it would develop electric vehicles, an offering the company has been slow to adopt, despite a pledge by the German government to get one million electric cars on the road by 2020.

Barbara Hendricks, the German minister for the environment, said the government should consider scrapping a tax break for diesel engines, shifting it instead to electric vehicles to encourage more environmentally friendly technology.

Volkswagen’s newly appointed chief executive, Matthias Müller, is scheduled to meet with the company’s top executives on Thursday. It will be Mr. Müller’s first such meeting since taking over from his predecessor, Martin Winterkorn, who stepped down last month, taking responsibility for the scandal.

On Oct. 12, Volkswagen said it would recall 1,950 diesel vehicles in China. But while China is a big automotive market for the company, it has sold very few diesels there. And there was no public indication that Beijing had ordered the recall.



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5) Medicare Premiums May Soar as Social Security Payments Stay Flat
By

WASHINGTON — The 60 million people on Social Security will not receive any cost-of-living increase in their benefits in 2016, the government said on Thursday, but because of a quirk in federal law, nearly one-third of them could see big increases in their Medicare premiums unless Congress intervenes.

The Obama administration is hoping Congress will moderate or stop the premium increases, which could raise the cost for some Medicare beneficiaries by about 50 percent — the largest increase, by far, in the history of Medicare.

Social Security has provided automatic cost-of-living adjustments in every year since 1975 with two exceptions, 2010 and 2011. But inflation was extremely low in 2015, triggering another benefit freeze, Social Security officials said. Gasoline prices, in particular, have declined sharply, holding down overall prices in the economy.

The purpose of the automatic increases is to preserve the purchasing power of Social Security benefits.Jason Furman, the chairman of President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, said recently that the lack of a cost-of-living adjustment resulted from a positive economic development: “The sharp decline in energy prices that is putting more money in families’ pockets” and contributing to the economic recovery.

Medicare still needs additional money to help pay for Part B of the program, which covers doctors’ services, outpatient hospital care and some prescription drugs.

About 70 percent of Medicare beneficiaries will be protected against higher premiums in 2016. But Medicare actuaries predicted in July that the standard premium for other beneficiaries would rise next year to $159 a month. The premium for most beneficiaries is now just under $105 a month, the same as in 2013 and 2014.

In the absence of legislative action, the White House faces a choice between two politically perilous options. It could authorize a big increase in Medicare premiums for more than 15 million beneficiaries. Or it could authorize the secretary of health and human services, Sylvia Mathews Burwell, to take money from Medicare’s “contingency reserve,” which serves as a cushion in case actual spending is higher than projected. The contingency fund is already lower than the level recommended by Medicare actuaries.


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6) Coal Baron’s Trial May Hinge on His Secretly Recorded Conversations
"Discussing inspectors from the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration, he complains that they pay too much attention to black lung disease, caused by excessive coal dust exposure. (Autopsies would find that 71 percent of the 29 miners killed at Upper Big Branch suffered from black lung, compared with an industry average of 3.2 percent, according to a 2011 state inquiry that attributed the blast to 'a failure of basic coal mine safety practices.') 'The truth of the matter,' Mr. Blankenship is heard saying, 'is black lung is not an issue in this industry that is worth the effort they put into it.'”

By

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/17/us/coal-barons-trial-may-turn-on-his-secretly-recorded-conversations.html?ref=us

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Back when he was one of the most powerful and feared men in West Virginia, before a coal mine explosion killed 29 of his employees and exposed his company’s shoddy safety record, Donald L. Blankenship was seen as an arrogant, micromanaging bully. Even his lawyer says he was “rude and insulting.”But in the end, another of his qualities — his penchant for secretly recording his own conversations — may help bring Mr. Blankenship down.

Mr. Blankenship is the former chairman and chief executive of Massey Energy, whose Upper Big Branch mine became, in April 2010, the site of the nation’s deadliest coal mining disaster in nearly 40 years. Now on trial in federal court here, he is the first coal baron ever to face criminal charges — the central character, prosecutors say, in a historic case of conspiracy to flout health and safety laws in pursuit of profits.

Defense lawyers say they will prove that Mr. Blankenship was deeply concerned with mine safety, and that he had committed no “willful violations” of safety laws, as the government asserts.

Mr. Blankenship’s rise and fall are the stuff of legend in Appalachia. Raised in a poor county, he built Massey from a family-owned company into an industry behemoth that operated more than 150 mines and brought in $2.6 billion in revenue. As prosecutors make their case against him, they have so far played 19 snippets from hundreds of hours of Mr. Blankenship’s secret audio files, which were turned over by the company that acquired Massey after the blast.

The tapes offer a peek into the mind of a man seemingly consumed with his own wealth and frustrated with federal regulators and company officials who pushed for more attention to safety. The prosecution hopes to offer three more recordings, but on Thursday, defense lawyers asked Judge Irene C. Berger, who is presiding over the case, to block them.

In one conversation, Mr. Blankenship complains that Massey’s top safety official is too concerned with “the social aspects” of her job: “You’ve got to have someone who actually understands that this game is about money.” In another, he frets over a confidential internal safety memo — central to the prosecution’s case — that warned, among other things, of poor ventilation at mines and said Massey was “plainly cheating” in sampling coal dust, a health hazard and a fire accelerant.

He worries how things will look if Massey is sued. “If that was a fatal today, or if we had one,” Mr. Blankenship says, an apparent reference to an accident, “it’d be a terrible document to be in discovery.”

Discussing inspectors from the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration, he complains that they pay too much attention to black lung disease, caused by excessive coal dust exposure. (Autopsies would find that 71 percent of the 29 miners killed at Upper Big Branch suffered from black lung, compared with an industry average of 3.2 percent, according to a 2011 state inquiry that attributed the blast to “a failure of basic coal mine safety practices.”)

“The truth of the matter,” Mr. Blankenship is heard saying, “is black lung is not an issue in this industry that is worth the effort they put into it.”

The recordings also reveal Mr. Blankenship’s clashes with Massey’s compensation committee over a $12 million pay package for him that included stock options. “I said, ‘You can’t go to the grocery store and buy groceries with options,’” he tells a woman he was dating, after remarking that he was glad she liked the flowers he had sent.

Mr. Blankenship, 65, faces up to 31 years in prison on three felony counts, including conspiracy to violate mine safety standards and hide hazards from federal inspectors, lying to securities regulators and misleading investors about safety practices in an effort to maintain Massey’s stock price — and his fortune.

He has denied any wrongdoing.

That he is being prosecuted at all is stunning, given his political clout in a state with a long, sordid history of coal-mine tragedies, stretching back to at least the late 1800s. He spent $5 million to elect one State Supreme Court justice, which prompted a documentary film labeling him “The Kingmaker,” and he was photographed on the French Riviera with another. Both later voted to throw out a $50 million jury verdict against Massey.

“Politicians, Democrats and Republicans, flocked to Blankenship,” said Patrick McGinley, a law professor at West Virginia University who contributed to the state inquiry. “He was viewed by many as untouchable, just like all the other corporate executives of coal companies that killed scores or hundreds or thousands of miners over the last century.”

Prosecutors say that Mr. Blankenship was involved in the minutest details of life at Upper Big Branch, informed nearly every day of safety violations there, and that he had overruled managers who wanted to fix safety problems, demanding instead that they step up production and “run coal.”

David Hughart — a former high-level Massey executive who is serving a 42-month prison term connected to the 2010 disaster — testified to that effect this week, telling jurors he had approved safety shortcuts under “pressure to run, produce coal.” Mr. Hughart is one of four employees who have been convicted in connection with an investigation that followed the explosion.

Defense lawyers have countered with, among other things, Mr. Blankenship’s handwritten notes; he shunned computers. In one note, he approved purchases of safety equipment; in another, he berated underlings for not moving fast enough on a plan to reduce violations.

“The only thing more frightening to our future than regulators is us,” Mr. Blankenship wrote.

The defense also contends that Mr. Blankenship was far removed from daily life at Upper Big Branch. But Michael B. Hissam, who worked on the early stages of the mine investigation as a federal prosecutor and now represents coal-industry clients, said the audiotapes “are the answer to the busy C.E.O. defense,” because they “show Don Blankenship having hands-on micromanagement involvement.”

Mr. Blankenship’s recordings are “a gift he gave to the families” of the dead miners, said Judy Jones Petersen, a Charleston doctor whose brother Dean Jones, a mine foreman, was killed. “The jury gets an opportunity to hear this snively character whining about his stock options,” she said. “It’s rather pathetic.”The trial has also painted a grim portrait of conditions at Upper Big Branch, where rough-hewn miners working miles underground often feared for their safety. Several testified that they had been tipped off, in code language by superiors, when federal inspectors were on the way and been told to hastily fix violations.

One former miner, Brent Racer, described hearing the president of the Massey subsidiary that operated Upper Big Branch hassling a mine boss who tried to improve ventilation, telling him, “‘We would get more air soon, and we needed to worry about running.’”

Another, Gary Young, worked the overnight shift as a “rock duster” spreading limestone dust, a protective coating to hold down coal dust and prevent explosions. He told the jury that his equipment was often broken, and his shifts often truncated. Frustrated, he kept a journal to communicate with his manager. His last entry, two weeks before the blast, read, “I’m set up to fail.”

Defense lawyers have not said whether Mr. Blankenship will testify, but at court, he cuts an awkward figure. Accompanied by a team of Washington lawyers, he arrives each morning carrying a slightly battered black briefcase and walks, tight-lipped, past television cameras and reporters asking questions. During a break the other day, he sat by himself on a bench outside the courtroom.

He is not without supporters. Shannon Westerman, 77, a retired business owner who worked with Massey on a coal safety awareness program, turned up in court the other day to shake Mr. Blankenship’s hand.

“I think this is a political and media effort to destroy him,” Mr. Westerman said.

Coal mining has long been the lifeblood of the economy here, and many of the families who lost loved ones in the blast have deep roots in the industry.

Gary Quarles, a retired miner whose son, Gary Wayne Quarles, 33, died in the blast, was a miner himself. He and his wife, Patty, who has a tattoo on her left ankle of her son wearing his black miner’s hard hat, have been attending the proceedings.

The trial began last week; it is expected to run into November. By the end, Mr. Quarles said, the public will “see what kind of man Don really is.”

Five years after losing their son, the couple would like to see Mr. Blankenship convicted. But seeing him in court — surrounded by lawyers, listening to himself referred to as “the defendant” — is a kind of satisfaction in itself.

“To me, his privileges are gone,” Mrs. Quarles said. “As of right now, he can’t go to the Riviera. He can’t go to Vegas like he wanted to. He now is at someplace he’s never been, and that’s being controlled by other people. He’s not used to that.”


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7) Nebraska to Vote on Abolishing Death Penalty After Petition Drive Succeeds
By

More than four months after the Nebraska Legislature voted to abolish the death penalty, a petition drive by supporters of capital punishment in the state has succeeded in upending that vote and suspending the new law, the secretary of state’s office announced Friday.The petition drive, which collected more than 143,000 verified signatures from across the state, will force a statewide referendum in November 2016, when Nebraska voters will decide whether the state should have a death penalty.

The announcement was a clear victory for Gov. Pete Ricketts, a vigorous supporter of capital punishment and a major financial contributor to the petition effort. It was a blow to the coalition of legislators who argued in emotional hearings at the state Capitol in May that the death penalty system in Nebraska was inefficient, expensive and immoral.

But it also opened up new uncertainties surrounding the death penalty in Nebraska: With the repeal law suspended, would prosecutors once again seek the penalty when trying murder cases? Could the governor’s so far fruitless efforts to obtain lethal injection drugs succeed? And could an execution take place in the more than yearlong interim before the statewide referendum on the issue next November, as Nebraskans continue to be roiled by a debate over the death penalty?

“The thing is a total mess,” said Eric Berger, a law professor at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, who has written extensively on capital punishment. “It’s uncharted territory for everybody.”

Mr. Berger said that even the current status of the 10 men on death row — including whether they are legally on death row at all — could be seen as uncertain. “My guess is that this would ultimately be a losing argument,” he said, “but there’s at least a nonfrivolous argument that they could not be executed because their death sentences had been removed.”

Complicating matters further is a significant legal challenge that could invalidate the petition drive. In September, opponents of the death penalty filed a lawsuit against John Gale, the Nebraska secretary of state, arguing that Governor Ricketts should have been listed as a sponsor of the petition effort, as required by Nebraska law, given that he was a major financial contributor to the signature drive. The lawsuit says Governor Ricketts “personally and/or through his close advisers and agents managed, organized and controlled the referendum campaign.”

Governor Ricketts personally donated $200,000 to Nebraskans for the Death Penalty, the group that organized the petition drive.

A second lawsuit filed in September said the language on the petition drive was “unlawfully misleading.” The lawsuit, which names Mr. Gale and Doug Peterson, the attorney general, says that the question posed to voters through the petition drive inaccurately suggests that the death penalty could be replaced with a sentence less than life imprisonment.

Laura Strimple, a spokeswoman for the secretary of state, declined to comment on the continuing litigation.

Chris Peterson, a spokesman for Nebraskans for the Death Penalty, said in an email that over the next several months, the group planned to “defend the successful petition drive from frivolous litigation by our desperate opponents, and work to ensure that Nebraska voters have their voice heard on this important criminal justice issue.”

The death penalty has not been used in Nebraska since 1997, partly a reflection of Nebraskans’ uncertainty about the measure, said Robert Dunham, the executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington.

“There has been for 20 years a great deal of ambivalence about the death penalty in Nebraska,” Mr. Dunham said. “There has been substantial support for abolition, and there have been governors who have been in support of retaining it.”

Until Mr. Ricketts became governor, he said, previous governors “have expressed support for the death penalty, but they have not pushed to execute.”

In recent years, state officials have found it impossible to obtain sodium thiopental, a barbiturate used to administer lethal injections. In 2011, the sole manufacturer of sodium thiopental in the United States ceased making the drug.

Mr. Ricketts’s administration recently tried to buy $50,000 worth of sodium thiopental from a distributor in India, but the shipment was returned to the sender. The Food and Drug Administration warned that importing the drug was illegal.

Nebraska allows for a lengthy appeals process, making it possible for inmates to remain on death row for decades. One inmate, Carey Dean Moore, arrived on death row in 1980 after being convicted of killing two cabdrivers in Omaha.

Opponents of the death penalty vowed to fight until the referendum. Matt Maly, coordinator for Nebraska Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty, said the group planned to hold events in churches and schools to tell voters about “the facts of the broken death penalty system.”

But he said Mr. Ricketts’s continued inability to obtain the necessary drugs for an execution kept the situation relatively unchanged.

“There certainly is a little bit of ambiguity right now,” he said. “But in reality, it’s not affecting very much at all. We haven’t executed anyone in 20 years and don’t have the drugs for it. Nobody’s going to be executed in Nebraska anytime soon.”


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8) Ohio: Special Prosecutor Sought in Tamir Rice Killing
By



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9) Georgia: Verdicts in Jail Inmate’s Death
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/17/us/georgia-verdicts-in-jail-inmates-death.html?ref=us

Two former sheriff’s deputies were acquitted of involuntary manslaughter but convicted of lesser charges in the stun gun-related death of a detainee at the Chatham County jail. A Superior Court jury on Friday found former Cpl. Jason Kenny guilty of cruelty to an inmate and ex-Cpl. Maxine Evans guilty of public records fraud and lying to a grand jury. They were charged in the January death of Mathew Ajibade, who was found dead in a cell hours after being arrested on a domestic violence charge. Prosecutors said Mr. Kenny shocked Mr. Ajibade four times with a Taser while his hands and legs were restrained. Mr. Evans was accused of failing to check Mr. Ajibade’s condition while faking jail logs to make it appear checks had been made.

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10) VW Made Several Defeat Devices to Cheat Emissions Tests: Sources
By REUTERS

BERLIN/LOS ANGELES/DETROIT — Volkswagen made several versions of its "defeat device" software to rig diesel emissions tests, three people familiar with the matter told Reuters, potentially suggesting a complex deception by the German carmaker.During seven years of self-confessed cheating, Volkswagen altered its illegal software for four engine types, said the sources, who include a VW manager with knowledge of the matter and a U.S. official close to an investigation into the company.

Spokespersons for VW in Europe and the United States declined to comment on whether it developed multiple defeat devices, citing ongoing investigations by the company and authorities in both regions.

Asked about the number of people who might have known about the cheating, a spokesman at company headquarters in Wolfsburg, Germany, said: "We are working intensely to investigate who knew what and when, but it's far too early to tell."

Some industry experts and analysts said several versions of the defeat device raised the possibility that a range of employees were involved. Software technicians would have needed regular funding and knowledge of engine programs, they said.

The number of people involved is a key issue for investors because it could affect the size of potential fines and the extent of management change at the company, said Arndt Ellinghorst, an analyst at banking advisory firm Evercore ISI.

Brandon Garrett, a corporate crime expert at the University of Virginia School of Law, said federal prosecution guidelines would call for the U.S. Justice Department to seek tougher penalties if numerous senior executives were found to have been involved in the cheating.

"The more higher-ups that are involved, the more the company is considered blameworthy and deserving of more serious punishment," said Garrett.

VW, Europe's biggest carmaker, has been criticized by some lawmakers and analysts for blaming a small number of individuals for the banned software installed in up to 11 million vehicles worldwide, even while investigations continue.

Its U.S. chief, Michael Horn, told U.S. lawmakers earlier this month that he believed "a couple of software engineers" were responsible, while a letter dated Oct. 8 from VW to the European Parliament blamed "the misconduct of a few people."

MANY CHANGES

VW admitted publicly on Sept. 18 to using software that could tell when a diesel vehicle was being tested and temporarily lower its toxic emissions to pass U.S. regulations.

The scandal has wiped around a quarter off its stock market value and forced out its long-time chief executive.

When it started using defeat device software in 2008, VW installed it with the EA189 diesel engine. The software was subsequently added to the newer EA288 engine.

"VW would have had to reconfigure the software for each generation of engines," said the U.S. official close to an ongoing investigation into VW.

A U.S.-based expert on diesel engines and testing said the defeat device software also had to be altered when VW changed the emissions control system in its engines.

In older diesel models, VW used so-called Lean NOx Traps designed to reduce toxic nitrogen oxides in engine exhaust. From around 2012, it introduced a more sophisticated and expensive system called Selective Catalytic Reduction.

VW's Horn told U.S. lawmakers on Oct. 8 that different software was developed for Europe as well.

"Since the standards are different, my understanding is that the defeat devices in those (European) cars are as well," he said, without elaborating.

Horn added VW was withdrawing its application for regulatory certification of 2016 diesel models because it contained another software feature that had not been disclosed as required by the authorities. [ID:nL1N1271US]

(Additional reporting by Laurence Frost, Joel Schectman, Gilles Guillaume and Joe White; Writing by Mark Potter; Editing by Janet McBride)
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