Wednesday, October 12, 2016

BAUAW NEWSLETTER, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 12, 2016

Appeals Court Dissolves Work Freeze On Pipeline


Posted on October 9, 2016

Breaking: The DC Appellate Court – which heard arguments related to the temporary injunction to halt construction on the Dakota Access Pipeline on Wednesday – ruled to dissolve its administrative injunction and allow the Dakota Access pipeline to move forward with construction up to Lake Oahe.
The following is a statement from the MAIN Coalition:
“We are pleased, but not surprised, by the Court’s decision as this demonstrates that the Army Corps of Engineers did, indeed, meet the requirements required by the law.  As laid out in Judge Boasberg’s opinion, the corps consulted 389 times with 55 tribes including the Standing Rock Sioux. Not only was the letter of the law met, but considering the lengths the corps and Dakota Access, LLC, went, so too was the spirit. 
We continue to believe that as long as the ultimate administrative and judicial decisions are based on the facts, science, engineering, and the rule of law the Dakota Access Pipeline will become operational without additional delay.” 
http://standingrockfactchecker.org/appeals-court-dissolves-work-freeze-pipeline/

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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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TONIGHT!


Let’s Re-ignite the Movement to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal!

From: Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal

To: Organizations Concerned with Prisoner Rights, Racism, and Police Terror

Meeting, 6 pm Wed. Oct.12th, The Omni  4799 Shattuck (near 48th and 49th), Oakland

Dear Comrades and Friends,

We write to you in the midst of on-going struggles which unite us all: opposition to rampant police killings of Black men; freedom for political prisoners including former Black Panthers, Oscar Lopez Rivera and Leonard Peltier; opposition to the death penalty, life without parole, solitary confinement; big pharma price-gouging; immigrant deportations; the Standing Rock resistance to the destruction of both native lands and the environment; the Puerto Rican struggle against imperialist oppression; and defense of Palestinians from Zionist terror.  

We are writing to advocate joining together now in a renewed fight for freedom for Mumia Abu-Jamal. December 9, 2016 will be 35 years since the police tried to execute Mumia on the streets of Philadelphia and then framed him, with the complicity of the prosecution and the court, and sentenced him to death. It took international mass mobilization to prevent his execution. It is taking protest and publicity to keep him alive in prison and to get him treatment for his Hepatitis C. 

A recent U.S. Supreme Court decision (Williams v. Pennsylvania) ruled that a prosecutor cannot later sit as judge over the same defendant. This is precedent setting for Mumia who has filed a new legal action based on the fact that Mumia’s appeals of his conviction from 1998 on were denied by Justice Ronald Castille who was the Philadelphia District Attorney,—his prosecutor—during his first appeal. If successful, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court rulings that upheld his conviction would be overturned. Mumia would be able to re-appeal the issues of his innocence, jury bias, falsified evidence to obtain a new trial, if not outright dismissal of charges.

It is unlikely that this new legal opportunity to win a court battle for Mumia’s freedom will be repeated. We began the struggle for Mumia’s freedom with the understanding that the fight for Mumia is one that encompasses the fight against capitalist, racist injustice from police street execution to the legal lynching of the death penalty, to frame-up convictions, mass incarceration, and all the horrors of the U.S. prison system. The fight for Mumia is a defense of those who stand in opposition to the policies of U.S. imperialism; it is a case of Black Lives Matter.

Mumia has never succumbed to the state’s attempt to silence him. He is a beacon of light and hope for other prisoners across the US, as well as for all victims of imperialist war, racism and the “incarceration nation.”

We support all legal actions in Mumia’s defense but recognize that there is no justice in the capitalist courts. The Labor Action Committee to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal (LAC) focuses on mass and labor actions to free Mumia. Without such action, the new case for Mumia’s freedom will—as similar attempts have before—be consigned to the “Mumia exception” judicial waste-bucket. We continue to work to get international labor support for Mumia’s freedom and for Hep C treatment. Mumia’s struggles, if supported by a mass movement can not only free him, but also help unite struggles of prisoners and other victims of the racist-imperialist-capitalist system throughout the world.

We support a renewed campaign to free Mumia Abu-Jamal. An event is planned for Philadelphia for December 9, 2016 initiated by the Concerned Family and Friends of Mumia Abu-Jamal and the New York Campaign to Bring Mumia Home and a call is in the works.
Slogans being put forward for this event are:
Mumia is Innocent and Framed! Free Mumia, Now!
Abolish the Racist Death Penalty! End Solitary Confinement!  End Life Imprisonment without Parole! Quality Health Care for all Prisoners! Hep C Meds for All!
End Mass Incarceration! Black Lives Matter! No Stop and Frisk!

We ask you to join us in an effort to reignite the struggle to free Mumia, on all fronts.  We will look forward to seeing you for an organizing meeting at the Omni house, 6 pm October 12, 2016 to plan action here in the Bay Area.

Please call Carole 415 483-4428 or Bob at 510 595-7811 for more information.  See you on the 12th of October at the Omni!

In solidarity,
Labor Action Committee to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal

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Electronic Intifada co-founder/director Ali Abunimah
Tuesday, October 18 in OAKLAND

NOTE CHANGE OF VENUE!
Electronic Intifada co-founder/director ALI ABUNIMAH!
Tuesday, October 18, 7pm
First Congregational Church of OAKLAND
2501 Harrison Ave. (at 27th)
Turning Point for the Palestine Solidarity Movement: Can Israeli Apartheid Really Be Defeated?
Ali Abunimah is a Palestinian-American journalist and author of “The Battle for Justice in Palestine” -- which won the 2014 Palestine Book Award -- and “One Country, A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse.” He received the 2013 Lannan Cultural Freedom Fellowship and has been an activist on these issues for over 20 years.
Alice Walker calls him “a special voice to champion us, one that is… fierce, wise -- a warrior for justice and peace -- someone whose large heart, one senses, beyond his calm, is constantly on fire.”
$15 general admission -- also: $10 low income, $25 Supporter, $50 Freedom Fighter, $100 Changemaker
Buy any of these tickets directly from MECA and avoid the service charge: call Sue at 510-548-0542 weekdays, or email Susan@mecaforpeace.org
Buy $15 tickets at these bookstores and avoid a service change: (East Bay) Moe's, Diesel, Walden Pond; (SF) Modern Times.
Benefit for MECA, wheelchair accessible
Cosponsored by KPFA, Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC), Jewish Voice for Peace/Bay Area

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Chelsea Manning Support Network
Chelsea faces charges related to suicice attempt
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View it in your browser.

Chelsea Manning ends 5 day hunger strike after Army agrees to medical treatment

Chelsea Manning ended her hunger strike today (Sept 13) after the Army finally agreed to treatment for her gender dysphoria.
"This is all that I wanted – for them to let me be me,” said Chelsea Manning.
“But it is hard not to wonder why it has taken so long and why such drastic measures were needed in order to get this help that was recommended.”
Chelsea was shown a memo today stating she will receive gender-reassignment surgery under the DoD’s new policy affecting transgender service members.
If this occurs, Manning will be the first trans prisoner in the US to receive this treatment, setting a precedent that could benefit thousands of transgender inmates.
“This medical care is absolutely vital for Chelsea. It was the government’s refusal to provide her with necessary care that led her to attempt suicide earlier this year,” said Chase Strangio, Chelsea’s attorney at the ACLU, “and it was all the more troubling when she became subject to an investigation and possible punishment in connection with the suicide attempt.
We hope that the government recognizes that charging Chelsea with the crime of being denied essential health care is outrageous and drops those charges.” Read more here

Daniel Ellsberg, Michael Stipe protest
inhumane charges against Chelsea

After years of inhumane treatment from the Army, Chelsea Manning attempted to take her life on July 5th, 2016. 
If convicted of these absurd “administrative offenses”, Chelsea could face indefinite solitary confinement for the rest of her prison term (30 years).
Daniel Ellsberg: “I stand with Chelsea Manning. I hope you will too.”
Michael Stipe: “I support human rights for all people. As an American patriot it is my duty to stand with Chelsea Manning... This is unjustifiable. It is unfair, and it needs to be stopped.” Read more and watch the videos
Chelsea will face a disciplinary board later this month, and could very likely be charged for her own suicide attempt. 

Chelsea can continue to be a powerful voice for reform, but we need your help to make that happen. Help us support Chelsea in prison, maximize her voice in the media, continue public education, fund her legal appeals team, and build a powerful movement for presidential pardon.

Please donate today!

https://co.clickandpledge.com/sp/d1/default.aspx?wid=38591

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Defying the Tomb: Selected Prison Writings and Art of Kevin "Rashid" Johnson featuring exchanges with an Outlaw Kindle Edition

by Kevin Rashid Johnson (Author), Tom Big Warrior (Introduction), Russell Maroon Shoatz(Introduction)

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http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B013RU5M4S



Join the Fight to Free Rev. Pinkney!

Click HERE to view in browser

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

UPDATE:

Today is the 406th day that Rev. Edward Pinkney of Benton Harbor, Michigan
languishes in prison doing felony time for a misdemeanor crime he did not
commit. Today is also the day that Robert McKay, a spokesperson for the
Free Rev. Pinkney campaign, gave testimony before United Nations
representatives about the plight of Rev. Pinkney at a hearing held in
Chicago. The hearing was called in order to shed light upon the
mistreatment of African-Americans in the United States and put it on an
international stage. And yet as the UN representatives and audience heard
of the injustices in the Pinkney case many gasped in disbelief and asked
with frowns on their faces, "how is this possible?" But disbelief quickly
disappeared when everyone realized these were the same feelings they had
when they first heard of Flint and we all know what happened in Flint. FREE
REV. PINKNEY NOW.

Please send letters to:
Marquette Branch Prison
Rev. Edward Pinkney N-E-93 #294671
1960 US Hwy 41 South
Marquette, MI 49855

Please donate at http://bhbanco.org (Donate button) or send checks to BANCO:
c/o Dorothy Pinkney
1940 Union St.
Benton Harbor, MI 49022

BACKGROUND:

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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State Seeks to Remove Innocent PA Lifer’s Attorney! Free Corey Walker!





The PA Office of the Attorney General (OAG) filed legal action to remove Corey Walker’s attorney, Rachel Wolkenstein, in November 2014. On Tuesday, February 9, 2016 the evidentiary hearing to terminate Wolkenstein as Corey Walker’s pro hac vice lawyer continues before Judge Lawrence Clark of the Dauphin County Court of Common Pleas in Harrisburg, PA.

Walker, assisted by Wolkenstein, filed three sets of legal papers over five months in 2014 with new evidence of Walker’s innocence and that the prosecution and police deliberately used false evidence to convict him of murder. Two weeks after Wolkenstein was granted pro hac vice status, the OAG moved against her and Walker.

The OAG claims that Wolkenstein’s political views and prior legal representation of Mumia Abu-Jamal and courtroom arrest by the notorious Judge Albert Sabo makes it “intolerable” for her to represent Corey Walker in the courts of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

Over the past fifteen months the OAG has effectively stopped any judicial action on the legal challenges of Corey Walker and his former co-defendant, Lorenzo Johnson against their convictions and sentences to life imprisonment without parole while it proceeds in its attempts to remove Wolkenstein.

This is retaliation against Corey Walker who is innocent and framed. Walker and his attorney won’t stop until they thoroughly expose the police corruption and deliberate presentation of false evidence to convict Corey Walker and win his freedom.

This outrageous attack on Corey Walker’s fundamental right to his lawyer of choice and challenge his conviction must cease. The evidence of his innocence and deliberate prosecutorial frame up was suppressed for almost twenty years. Corey Walker must be freed!

Read: Jim Crow Justice – The Frame-up Of Corey Walker by Charles Brover

Go to FreeCoreyWalker.org to provide help and get more information.

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TAKE ACTION: Mumia is sick

Contact: Prison Radio  (info@prisonradio.org)
Website: 
http://bit.ly/hepcfaq

Judge Robert Mariani of the U.S. District Court has issued an order in Mumia’s case, granting Mumia’s lawyers Bret Grote and Robert Boyle’s motion to supplement the record. 

New medical records documenting Mumia’s deteriorated condition from February and March, will be presented June 6th. Judge Mariani has also instructed the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections to provide any updates and changes in DOC hep C treatment and policies which affect the plaintiff’s treatment.

Calling into Prison Radio, Mumia noted: 

“My friends, my brothers, it ain’t over ‘til it’s over, but there is some motion. It means that we’re moving closer to hopefully some real treatment not of my symptoms, but of my disease. I thank you all for being there. And freedom is a constant struggle. I love you all. From what used to be death row, this is Mumia, your brother.”
 
Mumia remains quite ill. While stable, his curable hepatitis C is still active and progressive. The only treatment Mumia has received over the last 14 months to this day is skin ointment and photo therapy. He has not received the medically indicated treatment for hep C, the very condition that put him in the Intensive Care Unit in March 2015. 

Hepatitis C is a progressive disease that attacks Mumia’s organs, skin and liver. Unless the court orders the new hepatitis C treatment - one pill a day for 12 weeks, with a 95% cure rate - Mumia's health will remain at serious risk.

Before the court is the preliminary injunction motion, which demands immediate medical care.

The exhaustion of administrative remedy and the procedural hurdles make it extremely difficult for people in prison to actually get their grievances heard through the review process. The Prison Litigation Reform Act was passed specifically to create these very almost insurmountable barriers to access to the courts.

Please read the New Yorker article, Why it is Nearly Impossible for Prisoners to Sue Prisons.

In Abu-Jamal vs. Kerestes, one very telling point was when the DOC's Director of Medical Care, Dr. Paul Noel, took the stand. He said that he had never testified before in court! He has worked for the DOC for over a decade.   

That meant that no prisoner had access to adversarial cross examination. Before Mumia’s day in court in late December 2015, no prisoner ever had the opportunity to expose the PA DOC’s blatant lies. Lies so bold that Dr. Noel disavowed his own signed affidavit, and in court he stated that he “did not sign it and it was false and misleading”. The knowingly false and fabricated document was put in the record by Laura Neal, Senior DOC attorney.

Take Action for Mumia


Call prison officials to demand immediate treatment!

Dr. Paul Noel-Director of Medical Care, DOC
717-728-5309 x 5312

John Wetzel- Secretary of DOC
717+728-2573 x 4109

Dr. Carl Keldie-Chief Medical Officer, Correct Care Solutions
800-592-2974 x 5783

Theresa DelBalso-Superintendent, SCI Mahanoy
570-773-2158 x 8101
    Tom Wolf, PA Governor 
    Phone  717-787-2500
    Fax 717-772-8284                                            
    Email governor@pa.gov

    Sign the Petition now to demand Mumia's right to life-saving hepatitis C care.
    Help Mumia's lawyers prepare to demand access to Mumia's medical records from court!
    Thank you for keeping Mumia in your heart and mind,
    Noelle Hanrahan
    Director, Prison Radio

    SUPPORTERS OF MUMIA ABU-JAMAL, AND FREE QUALITY HEALTH CARE FOR ALL:
    The Oasis Clinic in Oakland, CA, which treats patients with Hepatitis-C (HCV), demands an end to the outrageous price-gouging of Big Pharma corporations, like Gilead Sciences, which hike-up the cost for essential, life-saving medications such as the cure for the deadly Hepatitis-C virus, in order to reap huge profits. The Oasis Clinic’s demand is:

    PUBLIC HEALTH, NOT CORPORATE WEALTH!


    WE DEMAND:

    PUBLIC HEALTH, NOT CORPORATE WEALTH!

    IMMEDIATE AND FREE TREATMENT FOR ALL HCV-INFECTED PRISONERS!

    NO EXECUTION BY MEDICAL NEGLECT!

    JAIL DRUG PROFITEERS, FREE MUMIA!

    This message from:
    Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
    PO Box 16222 • Oakland CA 94610 • www.laboractionmumia.org
    06 January 2016

    Mumia Is Innocent!  Free Mumia!
     

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    Imam Jamil (H.Rap Brown) moved

    Imam Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin (H. Rap Brown) was moved by bus from USP Canaan in Waymart, PA. to USP Tucson, Arizona.  His mailing address is:  USP Tucson United States Penitentiary P.O. Box Tucson, AZ. 85734  (BOP number 99974555)

    Sign the Petition:

    DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, THE Bureau of Prisons, The Governor of Georgia

    We are aware of a review being launched of criminal cases to determine whether any defendants were wrongly convicted and or deserve a new trail because of flawed forensic evidence and or wrongly reported evidence. It was stated in the Washington Post in April of 2012 that Justice Department Officials had known for years that flawed forensic work led to convictions of innocent people. We seek to have included in the review of such cases that of Imam Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin. We understand that all cases reviewed will include the Innocence Project. We look forward to your immediate attention to these overdue wrongs.
    ASAP: The Forgotten Imam Project
    P.O. Box 373
    Four Oaks, NC 27524
    Signed,
    Luqman Abdullah-ibn Al-Sidiq

    https://www.causes.com/actions/1671495-the-forgotten-imam-jamil-abdullah-al-amin-h-rap-brown?utm_campaign=post_mailer%2Fcampaign_update.cb_71432&utm_medium=email&utm_source=causes

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    Major Battles On
    For over 31 years, Major Tillery has been a prisoner of the State.
    Despite that extraordinary fact, he continues his battles, both in the prison for his health, and in the courts for his freedom.
    Several weeks ago, Tillery filed a direct challenge to his criminal conviction, by arguing that a so-called "secret witness" was, in fact, a paid police informant who was given a get-out-of-jail-free card if he testified against Tillery.
    Remember I mentioned, "paid?"
    Well, yes--the witness was 'paid'--but not in dollars. He was paid in sex!
    In the spring of 1984, Robert Mickens was facing decades in prison on rape and robbery charges. After he testified against Tillery, however, his 25-year sentence became 5 years: probation!
    And before he testified he was given an hour and a ½ private visit with his girlfriend--at the Homicide Squad room at the Police Roundhouse. (Another such witness was given another sweetheart deal--lie on Major, and get off!)
    To a prisoner, some things are more important than money. Like sex!
    In a verified document written in April, 2016, Mickens declares that he lied at trial, after being coached by the DAs and detectives on the case.
    He lied to get out of jail--and because he could get with his girl.
    Other men have done more for less.
    Major's 58-page Petition is a time machine back into a practice that was once common in Philadelphia.
    In the 1980s and '90s, the Police Roundhouse had become a whorehouse.
    Major, now facing serious health challenges from his hepatitis C infection, stubborn skin rashes, and dangerous intestinal disorders, is still battling.
    And the fight ain't over.
    [©'16 MAJ  6/29/16]
    Major Tillery Needs Your Help and Support
    Major Tillery is an innocent man. There was no evidence against Major Tillery for the 1976 poolroom shootings that left one man dead and another wounded. The surviving victim gave a statement to homicide detectives naming others—not Tillery or his co-defendant—as the shooters. Major wasn’t charged until 1980, he was tried in 1985.
    The only evidence at trial came from these jailhouse informants who were given sexual favors and plea deals for dozens of pending felonies for lying against Major Tillery. Both witnesses now declare their testimony was manufactured by the police and prosecution. Neither witness had personal knowledge of the shooting.
    This is a case of prosecutorial misconduct and police corruption that goes to the deepest levels of rot in the Philadelphia criminal injustice system. Major Tillery deserves not just a new trial, but dismissal of the charges against him and his freedom from prison.
    It cost a lot of money for Major Tillery to be able to file his new pro se PCRA petition and continue investigation to get more evidence of the state misconduct. He needs help to get lawyers to make sure this case is not ignored. Please contribute, now.

    HOW YOU CAN HELP
      Financial Support: Tillery's investigation is ongoing, to get this case filed has been costly and he needs funds for a legal team to fight this to his freedom!
      Go to JPay.com;
      code: Major Tillery AM9786 PADOC
      Tell Philadelphia District Attorney
      Seth Williams:
      Free Major Tillery! He is an innocent man, framed by police and and prosecution.
      Call: 215-686-8711 or

      Write to:
      Major Tillery AM9786
      SCI Frackville
      1111 Altamont Blvd.
      Frackville, PA 17931

        For More Information, Go To: Justice4MajorTillery/blogspot
        Call/Write:
        Rachel Wolkenstein, Esq. (917) 689-4009, RachelWolkenstein@gmail.com





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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
          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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          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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          Campaign to Free Lorenzo Johnson


          Updates from Team Lorenzo Johnson

          Dear Supporters and Friends,


          Show your support for Lorenzo by wearing one of our beautiful new campaign t-shirts! If you donate $20 (or more!) to the Campaign to Free Lorenzo Johnson, we will send you a t-shirt, while supplies last. Make sure to note your size and shipping address in the comment section on PayPal, or to include this information with a check.




          Here is a message from Lorenzo's wife, Tazza Salvatto:

          My husband is innocent, FREE HIM NOW!
          Lorenzo Johnson is a son, husband, father and brother. His injustice has been a continued nightmare for our family. Words cant explain our constant pain, I wish it on no one. Not even the people responsible for his injustice. 
          This is about an innocent man who has spent 20 years and counting in prison. The sad thing is Lorenzo's prosecution knew he was innocent from day one. These are the same people society relies on to protect us.

          Not only have these prosecutors withheld evidence of my husbands innocence by NEVER turning over crucial evidence to his defense prior to trial. Now that Lorenzo's innocence has been revealed, the prosecution refuses to do the right thing. Instead they are "slow walking" his appeal and continuing their malicious prosecution.
          When my husband or our family speak out about his injustice, he's labeled by his prosecutor as defaming a career cop and prosecutor. If they are responsible for Lorenzo's wrongful conviction, why keep it a secret??? This type of corruption and bullying of families of innocent prisoners to remain silent will not be tolerated.
          Our family is not looking for any form of leniency. Lorenzo is innocent, we want what is owed to him. JUSTICE AND HIS IMMEDIATE FREEDOM!!! 

                                    Lorenzo's wife,
                                     Tazza Salvatto
          Lorenzo is continuing to fight for his freedom with the support of his lead counsel, Michael Wiseman, The Pennsylvania Innocence Project, the Jeffrey Deskovic Foundation for Justice, and the Campaign to Free Lorenzo Johnson.
          Thank you all for reading this message and please take the time to visit our 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
                                               or
                        Directly on ConnectNetwork -- instructions here

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

          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

          freelorenzojohnson.org

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          B. ARTICLES IN FULL


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          1)  Joakim Noah, Averse to Wars, Skips Knicks Event at West Point
          By CHRISTOPHER MELE


          2)  Outrage Over Fish Kill in Vietnam Simmers 6 Months Later
          By MIKE IVES
          3)  Death Penalty Loses Majority Support for First Time in 45 Years
          By NIRAJ CHOKSHI


          4)  Julian Assange, WikiLeaks Founder, Promises Raft of Revelations
          By MELISSA EDDY
          5)  Protesters in Poland Rally Against Proposal for Total Abortion Ban
          By JOANNA BERENDT
          6)  Protest Started by Colin Kaepernick Spreads to High School Students
          By JULIE TURKEWITZ
          7)  In Video, Sacramento Police Appear to Try to Hit Man With Their Car Before He’s Fatally Shot
          By CHRISTINE HAUSER
          8)  When It Comes to Tax Avoidance, Donald Trump’s Just a Small Fry
          Andrew Ross Sorkin
          DEALBOOK 


          9)  A Bill of Rights for Housecleaners
          By ISABEL ESCOBAR
          10)  Toll Rises by Hour in Haiti Amid Ruin Left by Hurricane Matthew
          By AZAM AHMED


          11)  Seeing ‘Nothing to Live For’ as Haiti Seeks a Body Count After Hurricane Matthew
          By AZAM AHMED

          12)  Why Care at Native American Hospitals Is Often Substandard
          By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
          13)  Queens Prosecutor Releases 71-Page Report on a Fatal Police Shooting
          By RICK ROJAS and ALAN FEUER
          14)  Selling Shampoo, Eye Cream and a Chemical Crackdown
          Revalued
          By  DAVID GELLES 

          15)  South African Priest Injured in Student Protest
          By MEGAN SPECIA

          16)  Police Use Surveillance Tool to Scan Social Media, A.C.L.U. Says
          By JONAH ENGEL BROMWICH, DANIEL VICTOR and MIKE ISAAC




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          1)  Joakim Noah, Averse to Wars, Skips Knicks Event at West Point
          By CHRISTOPHER MELE



          Joakim Noah, the Knicks center, said he had skipped a team dinner at the United States Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., on Thursday because he is against war.
          According to news reports, Noah said he had “mixed feelings” about being at West Point, where the team was holding its training camp this week. On Thursday, the team attended a dinner with cadets that included remarks from a retired Army colonel.
          “It’s hard for me a little bit,” Noah said after a practice on Friday, ESPN reported. “I have a lot of respect for the kids who are out here fighting. But it’s hard for me to understand why we have to go to war, why kids have to kill kids around the world.”

          He added: “At the end of the day, I’m not anti-troops. It’s just not comfortable for me to see kids going out to war and coming back having seen what they’ve seen, having done what they’ve done.”
          The academy issued a statement on Friday that said, “We are disappointed and feel Mr. Noah’s choice of West Point to make a statement is inappropriate because of the great sacrifice that has originated from this institution over our nation’s history.”
          Noah’s remarks came against a backdrop of athletes making gestures in protest. In late summer, Colin Kaepernick of the San Francisco 49ers chose not to stand during the national anthem before his N.F.L. games to protest racial injustice, touching off a national debate.
          Noah was not prompted by the actions of other athletes, Alyson Furch, senior director of communications for his management team, BDA Sports Management, said in an interview on Friday night.
          She said that Noah, who joined the Knicks in July on a four-year, $72 million contract, had not intended to be disrespectful or malicious and was “extremely apologetic.” He has long spoken out against violence, she said. “If he’d had another second to say what he said, he would probably would have said it a little differently,” Furch said.
          Knicks Coach Jeff Hornacek told ESPN that he supported Noah’s decision.
          “Oh, absolutely,” he said. “Jo’s done, in all his stuff that he does against gun violence and all that, he just didn’t feel comfortable, so that’s plenty fine with us.”


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          2)  Outrage Over Fish Kill in Vietnam Simmers 6 Months Later
          By MIKE IVES

          HONG KONG — Six months after a chemical spill killed tons of fish and devastated fishing communities along Vietnam’s central coast, anger over the episode is still raw, posing a challenge for a government that has struggled to address it.
          In the latest sign of this festering outrage, thousands of demonstrators swarmed a steel factory in the central province of Ha Tinh on Sunday, echoing the street protests that erupted in the country’s major cities in April when photographs of piled-up fish corpses were widely shared on social media.
          After weeks of silence, officials acknowledged in late June that the Formosa Ha Tinh Steel Corporation, the Taiwanese company that owns the steel factory, had caused the deaths by leaking chemicals into the adjacent South China Sea.
          Formosa admitted responsibility and agreed to pay $500 million in damages for what many Vietnamese consider one of the worst environmental disasters in the country’s modern history.
          But residents of coastal villages and towns, where fishing drives the economies, have continued to hold boisterous rallies against the government and the company.
          At Sunday’s rally, organized by a local Roman Catholic diocese, riot police officers outside the factory clashed with protesters before fleeing the scene, video and photographs circulating on social media show. Some of the protesters later climbed atop the factory’s outer wall.
          Demonstrators said in telephone interviews on Monday that they had attended the rally to demand that Formosa close the factory and compensate them for damages. Hundreds of people from Ha Tinh have sued the company in recent weeks, many with assistance from the Catholic Church.
          Online reports about the protest in the state-controlled news media were quickly removed by the Vietnamese authorities, activists said, but the rally was widely discussed on Facebook. Neither the Vietnamese Foreign Ministry nor senior Formosa officials responded to requests for comment on Monday.
          The fish kill, which has primarily affected Ha Tinh and three other central provinces, was not the first environmental problem to incite public outrage in Vietnam. Last year, hundreds of people staged weekly protests in Hanoi, the capital, over a government plan to chop down 6,700 trees from the city’s boulevards. The protests, coupled with indignation on social media, prompted city officials to postpone the plan indefinitely.
          But the fish kill has had a broader national impact than the Hanoi tree protests, analysts say, in part because it has damaged the image of the Vietnamese seafood industry and prompted many in the country to reconsider eating what is a staple of their diet.
          In addition, many ordinary Vietnamese see Formosa’s Ha Tinh steel factory as a symbol of China’s economic influence in their country — a politically delicate topic that Vietnam’s one-party government has tried to play down, especially as China raises geopolitical tensions in Southeast Asia by aggressively pursuing its claims to disputed territory in the South China Sea.
          There is no indication of any involvement by Beijing in the project, but some Vietnamese have focused on the presence of mainland Chinese workers there and have blurred the distinction between China and Taiwan, the self-governing island that Beijing claims as Chinese territory.
          In May 2014, the factory was the site of violent protests over China’s placement of an oil rig in disputed waters in the South China Sea, off the Vietnamese coast. The factory was under construction at the time, and the construction workers were from a state-owned company from the mainland, the China Metallurgical Group, who had been hired to build it. During the same wave of violence, protesters also vandalized factories in southern Vietnam that were owned by companies from South Korea and Taiwan.
          After four of the Chinese workers were killed, the Chinese government evacuated about 3,000 workers from the factory by ship.
          This past June, after months of refusing to say definitively what had caused the fish kill, the Vietnamese government said it had occurred after Formosa leaked phenol, cyanide and iron hydroxide into the sea from its steel plant.
          But officials did not release any detailed scientific evidence to support their conclusion, raising questions about whether other contaminants had been detected but not publicly reported, said Nguyen Duc Hiep, an environmental scientist in Australia and a visiting researcher at Ton Duc Thang University in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.“The government tried to hide information and protect Formosa,” said Tran Viet Hoa, a fisherman who said his income had fallen more than 70 percent because of the fish kill. “If Formosa remains in Vietnam and doesn’t give us our clean environment back, we will continue to protest.”
          Another protester, Hoang Kim, said that he had seen more than 4,000 people at the rally and that many were Catholics. He said the protesters could have easily entered the factory compound but chose not to because they wanted only to make a point, not to vandalize property.
          “If there are heavy metals — for example, lead, mercury, cadmium, arsenic — then it will stay in the environment for a very long time, and it’s very toxic because it can go up the food chain and cause a lot of damage,” Professor Hiep said, adding that the three chemicals that were publicly disclosed are not necessarily toxic to fish in the long term.
          “A lot of people suspect the reason the scientific report didn’t come out is because there were a lot of heavy metals,” he added.
          The state news media has reported that the fish kill resulted in tens of thousands of lost jobs in the affected provinces, and protesters are questioning the government’s suggestions that the problem has largely been resolved.
          Nguyen Viet Thanh, a professor of environmental economics at Vietnam National University in Hanoi, said it was difficult to separate the effects of the toxic spill from the impact of overfishing and other problems that have long affected Vietnam’s coastal waters.
          But he said a general lack of trust in the government, along with the factory’s associations with mainland China and Taiwan, had damaged consumer confidence in the domestic seafood industry and made it difficult for many fishermen on the central coast to make a living.
          Conflicting accounts about the fish kill by several ministries in the weeks after the event only added to the suspicions, said Le Quang Binh, former director of the Hanoi-based Institute for Studies of Society, Economics and Environment. And because so many Vietnamese were debating the issue on social media, he added, they were able to spot inconsistencies and demand more public accountability.
          “In Vietnam, traditionally people avoid politics because it’s sensitive,” Mr. Binh said. “But now, more people understand that they cannot avoid politics because politics and policy can affect their lives.”
          One sign of public engagement with the controversy is the hashtag #IChooseFish that is popular on social media — a mass response to a Formosa spokesman’s saying at an April news briefing that the Vietnamese should decide whether to catch fish or “build a modern steel industry.” A cartoon that circulated on Facebook in the spring imagined President Obama, who visited Vietnam in May, uttering the phrase “I choose fish” at a dinner with Vietnamese officials.
          Jonathan D. London, a Vietnam expert at Leiden University in the Netherlands, said the intense public interest in the fish kill presented an acute problem for Vietnam’s top leaders, who took office in the spring.
          “They’re trying to do something that no leaders have had to do in the past,” he said, “which is essentially address public outrage that is being freely expressed on a daily basis.”











          Follow Mike Ives on Twitter @mikeives. 
          Chau Doan contributed reporting from Hanoi, Vietnam, and Richard C. Paddock from Manila.




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          3)  Death Penalty Loses Majority Support for First Time in 45 Years
          By NIRAJ CHOKSHI



          For the first time in almost half a century, support for the death penalty has dipped below 50 percent in the United States.
          Just 49 percent of Americans say they support capital punishment, according to a Pew Research Center poll conducted from late August to early September. That represents a seven-point decline in about a year and a half. Support peaked at 80 percent in 1994.

          The death penalty has had majority support among Americans for 45 years. The last time support was as low as it now stands was in 1971. Pew has surveyed Americans on the subject for the past two decades and relies on the polling organization Gallup for older data.
          Despite the large overall decline since the 1990s, attitudes toward executions differ drastically by political affiliation.
          “Much of the decline in support over the past two decades has come among Democrats,” wrote Baxter Oliphant, a research associate at Pew.
          Just 34 percent of Democrats support the death penalty today — less than half as many as in 1996, research shows. Support among Republicans declined over that period, too, but remains high: 72 percent back capital punishment today, down from 87 percent two decades ago.
          Independents, for the first time in decades, are about evenly split on the practice.
          Americans are divided on the subject by gender, generation and race. Men are more likely than women to support the death penalty; whites are much more likely than Hispanics or African-Americans to support it, the survey found. Fewer Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 support the death penalty than any other age group today.
          The flagging support for the death penalty aligns with a decline in the number of executions nationwide, which peaked in 1999 when 98 people were put to death, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. There have been 15 executions so far this year, and a few more are scheduled.
          Nine states have suspended capital punishment in the past five years, and 30 still allow it, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. Californians will weigh repealing capital punishment when they go to the polls in November.


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          4)  Julian Assange, WikiLeaks Founder, Promises Raft of Revelations
          By MELISSA EDDY

          BERLIN — Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, promised on Tuesday to release “significant material” over the next 10 weeks about arms, Google, mass surveillance, oil, the United States election and war.
          Speaking via a video link at a news conference in Berlin to mark a decade since the inception of WikiLeaks, Mr. Assange vowed that his organization would continue to provide a platform for the release of classified documents held by the United States and by other governments and institutions in positions of global power.
          “We hope to be publishing every week for the next 10 weeks, we have on schedule, and it’s a very hard schedule, all the U.S. election-related documents to come out before Nov. 8,” said Mr. Assange, who made his announcement from the Ecuadorean Embassy in London, where he has been living since 2012. “Our upcoming series includes significant material on war, arms, oil, Google, the U.S. elections and myself.”

          WikiLeaks used the occasion of its 10th anniversary to trumpet some of its most prominent releases of information, including documents about the United States detention camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba; files about the wars in Iraq and in Afghanistan; United States diplomatic cables; and Democratic Party emails that were made public on the eve of the party’s convention in Philadelphia.
          The remarks from Mr. Assange disappointed many followers of WikiLeaks in the United States, who had stayed up into the early hours hoping to hear information relevant to the presidential election.
          Although Mr. Assange promised to release such documents before the election on Nov. 8, he said, “If we are going to make a major publication, we don’t do it at 3 a.m.” in the United States.
          He dismissed speculation that the documents related to the United States election would contain information intended to damage the candidacy of Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee. The idea that “we intend to harm Hillary Clinton, or I intend to harm Hillary Clinton, or I don’t like Hillary Clinton, all those are false,” Mr. Assange said.
          Mr. Assange laughed when he was asked whether he felt any personal affinity for her Republican rival, Donald J. Trump, saying that he felt “personal affinity for all human beings.” He explained that he felt sorry for both Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Trump, given that “these are two people who are tormented by their ambitions.”
          Mr. Assange had been scheduled to make the announcement from the balcony of the embassy where he has been staying since Ecuador granted him political asylum, but he changed that plan at the last minute because of security reasons. He declined to give further details about those concerns.
          Mr. Assange sought refuge after he was charged with rape in Sweden, an accusation that he has denied, because he feared that if he were sent there, he would then be extradited to the United States to face espionage charges.


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          5)  Protesters in Poland Rally Against Proposal for Total Abortion Ban
          By JOANNA BERENDT
          WARSAW — Despite pouring rain and a chill in the air, Anna Pietruszka-Drozdz, together with as many as 24,000 other Polish women and men, skipped work on Monday and instead came to Castle Square in Warsaw, dressed in black, to protest a sweeping new anti-abortion bill.
          “A complete and total abortion ban? This is beyond my wildest nightmares,” said Ms. Pietruszka-Drozdz, 37, a mother of two. “Women don’t have abortions because they are promiscuous and it’s convenient. They do it because they need to, and it’s often the most traumatic decision ever.”
          On Black Monday, as it was called, huge protests against the new legislation swept through 90 Polish cities. The Warsaw mayor’s office said 24,000 Poles took to the streets of the capital, waving black flags to draw international attention to the proposed restrictions. On the event’s Facebook page, organizers said the protest drew up to 116,000 participants nationwide.
          Poland’s existing abortion law is already one of the most restrictive in Europe. Abortion is permitted in only three cases: a severe fetal anomaly, a threat to the mother’s health and life, or a pregnancy from rape or sexual abuse.
          Under the proposed legislation, written by an organization called Stop Abortion, all abortions would be criminalized. Women, doctors and anyone who assisted with the procedure could face up to five years in prison.
          “This is a barbarian proposal that will move Poland back to medieval times,” Barbara Nowacka, the leader of a liberal initiative, Save Women, said in a telephone interview. “The worst thing is that this barbarity finds approval in the eyes of those in power.”
          Black Monday was the high point of protests that began two weeks ago. On social media, tens of thousands of Poles have posted pictures of themselves wearing black and staging demonstrations.
          Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski dismissed the protesters, saying, “Let them have their fun.”
          “There is no such problem as a threat to women’s rights,” he said in an interview with a private radio station, RMF-FM. “If someone thinks that there are no greater concerns in Poland at the moment, let them be.”
          The protests have won the approval of numerous Polish employers, including restaurant owners, museum and gallery directors, the deans of several universities and mayors of a couple of large cities, all of whom allowed their female workers to take a day off.
          The protest idea was inspired by the story of Icelandic women who paralyzed their country in 1975 by not going to work, and skipping housework and child-rearing tasks, to protest unfair employment practices and wage discrepancies. The women who participated in those protests sent the women in Poland a video message of solidarity, encouraging them to stand up for themselves and telling them in Polish, “Jestesmy z wami” (“we are with you”). On Facebook, Kenyan women also sent a message of solidarity.
          The solidarity protests were also staged in other European cities, including Berlin, Brussels, London, Paris and Barcelona, Spain.
          Poland introduced a restrictive abortion law, known as the “abortion compromise” and championed by the Roman Catholic Church, in 1993 after the collapse of Communism.
          The church, which continues to be a powerful influence in this predominantly Catholic country, is often accused of exerting pressure on politicians. It actively supports the proposed legislation, though church leaders have said they oppose punishing women.
          According to official figures, around 1,000 legal abortions are performed in Poland every year. Estimates of the number of illegal terminations vary widely, from 10,000 to 120,000, from anti-abortion and abortion rights groups.
          “The abortion compromise was supposed to curb the number of illegal terminations and increase the number of births in Poland,” Ms. Nowacka said. “It has failed miserably on both accounts. We need a new law that actually corresponds with reality.”
          Critics of the legislation, which is supported by senior members of the right-wing government, argue that if the bill is passed, doctors will stop performing invasive procedures on pregnant women, even to correct a fetal defect, unless the woman’s life is directly threatened. That is the only exception under which doctors could undertake a procedure and avoid prosecution if it ended in a miscarriage.
          Dr. Romuald Debski, the head of gynecology and obstetrics at Bielanski Hospital in Warsaw, said every invasive procedure carries a minor risk of miscarriage.
          “This would be the end of prenatal diagnostics,” Dr. Debski said in an interview. “I couldn’t do basic prenatal tests, like the amniotic fluid test that allows me to determine whether I’m dealing with certain genetic disorders, such as Down syndrome. Should the procedure go wrong, I could end up in jail. I won’t risk that.”
          Tomasz Latos, a member of the governing Law and Justice party and head of the Health Committee in the Polish Sejm, or lower house of Parliament, said viewing the legislation as a threat to prenatal diagnostics was “either an act of ill will or incompetence.”
          “No one is saying that this bill will be even passed in the end,” he said. “Our senators are preparing a separate bill.”
          Katarzyna Plutowska, 44, and Malgorzata Zyra, 39, took a day off from their accounting jobs to join a demonstration held near the Palace of Science and Culture in Warsaw.
          “Due to the protest, our entire office is closed today,” Ms. Plutowska said. “You cannot change the world from your couch, you know.”




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          6)  Protest Started by Colin Kaepernick Spreads to High School Students
          By JULIE TURKEWITZ



          AURORA, Colo. — Vicqari Horton dropped a knee to the grass. The varsity choir piped out “The Star-Spangled Banner.” And in the bleachers at a sun-soaked football stadium here on Saturday, parents clenched their teeth in anger or raised their fists in support.
          “You can’t continue to slap people in the face and not expect them to stand up,” said Mr. Horton, a junior tight end at Aurora Central High School who is black and began kneeling during the national anthem at games in mid-September. “When Kaepernick kneeled, he gave us an outlet. He gave us something to do.”
          In the weeks since Colin Kaepernick, a San Francisco 49ers quarterback, took a knee during the national anthem — a protest against racial injustice — he has been discussed by President Obama, has been derided by Donald J. Trump and has helped to intensify an already roiling national debate about race, the police and the definition of patriotism.

          He has also pushed that conversation onto a quintessential American stage: the high school football field.
          Over the weekend, three-quarters of the 44 Aurora Central Trojans football players knelt during “The Star-Spangled Banner” before the team crushed a rival, the Hinkley Thunderbirds, 41-6. A thousand miles away, students at Madison East and Madison West High Schools in Wisconsin dropped to their knees, too.
          So have players at Garfield High School in Seattle; Castlemont High in Oakland, Calif.; Woodrow Wilson High in Camden, N.J.; and Mission High in San Francisco. At Omaha Central High, cheerleaders and band members have joined the protest. And in Beaumont, Tex., so have 11- and 12-year-olds from a youth team called the Beaumont Bulls. They have received a variety of responses: In the case of the Bulls, internet comments included a call for coaches to be lynched and the children to be killed.
          Here in Aurora, a sprawling, highly diverse suburb of Denver, the protest has invigorated a group of young people who have never known a world without viral videos of violence.
          They entered kindergarten about the time Facebook was born; were around the same age as Tamir Rice or Michael Brown, two African-Americans killed by police officers; and now attend one of the worst-performing schools in the state, a high school that is overwhelmingly black and Latino.
          In interviews, several students took issue with critics who told them that they did not understand what they were protesting. “We know what we’re doing; we made a conscious decision,” said Jalil Grimes, 17, a senior and the team’s starting quarterback. “We see police do us wrong. We see our teachers give up on us and expect us to fail. We’ve always seen this. Once we saw somebody else stand up against it, we just fell in line.”
          The idea of kneeling came from several players, including Mr. Horton, who approached their coaches to ask permission to do so. The coaches gave their support, and the school district issued a statement saying it would respect their actions. “Any time young kids can speak their minds, it’s always good,” said Tony Veasley, 49, a part-time coach for the Trojans who said six of his sons had graduated from Aurora Central.
          On Saturday, though, the stadium was a sea of hearts tied up in internal conflict.
          On the Hinkley side of the bleachers, near a mass of brass instruments and a cluster of exuberant cheerleaders — “Jam with us! Hey, hey!” — Melinda Holt, 60, a white Army veteran, sat with her husband, wearing Thunderbird blue. They were there to watch a grandson play, she said.
          “It’s ignorance,” Ms. Holt said of the kneelers. “You are dishonoring our flag for the actions of a few. That’s like holding every black man or every white man accountable for what somebody else has done. And that’s wrong.”
          On the other side of the stands, a Hispanic woman named Maria Mitchell — wearing Trojan green beside her daughter Téa — said she felt conflicted over the kneeling players. She spent more than 25 years as a military wife, she said, and believes that standing for the anthem is a way to honor lives lost in war.
          But her children are of mixed ethnicity — black and Hispanic. “And if you’re not a person of color, you don’t understand any of it,” she said. “To wake up every day and not know whether your kids are coming home or not, just because of their color, is ridiculous.”
          “Unless we walk in their shoes and feel what they feel on an everyday basis, we have no room to judge,” she continued. “We can choose to support, or not support and be blind.”
          The protests come at a turbulent time for Aurora Central, a school of 2,172 students that is 67 percent Hispanic and 16 percent black. More than 40 percent of students are learning English as a second language, nearly 70 percent qualify for free or reduced-price lunches, and officials have announced a drastic academic overhaul intended to stave off a school shutdown.
          Fights are a problem, and last year’s football game against Hinkley ended in a clash among students that forced the police to intervene.
          Christian Wells, 17, an offensive and defensive lineman, ended that night in police custody, after officers confused him with someone else, he said. This year at the Hinkley game, he chose to go down on one knee.
          “I’ve seen police brutality up close and personal,” he said. “To family members. To friends. To myself personally. It’s like, if nothing else will stop it, maybe silently protesting will do something.”
          On Saturday, the Trojans finished the game in a cascade of cheers, bouncing out of the stadium and onto a yellow team bus. In the parking lot, a 13-year-old Trojan fan, Damian Chavez, called the decision to kneel a “sign of respect for every black person in the country.”
          A few hundred feet away, inside the empty stadium, the 81-year-old press box manager, Bob Blair, dressed in cowboy boots and Wrangler slacks, looked out onto the field.
          “They’ve never been anywhere to see what the rest of the world hasn’t got and what we have: It’s called freedom,” Mr. Blair said. “We don’t agree with it, but we can’t stop it.”


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          7)  In Video, Sacramento Police Appear to Try to Hit Man With Their Car Before He’s Fatally Shot
          By CHRISTINE HAUSER

          The Sacramento County district attorney is investigating the fatal police shooting of a homeless black man who was hit 14 times in an encounter that was captured on dashboard cameras, leading to calls by his family for a federal investigation and for murder charges to be filed against the two officers.
          A lawyer for the family of the man, Joseph Mann, who was in his early 50s, said he had asked the Justice Department to investigate the episode in July, in which the white officers appeared in the video to be trying to run him over with their patrol car.
          “I see it as murder,” John L. Burris, a lawyer for the family of Mr. Mann, said on Monday. “They treated this person like he was a worthless human being.”
          The officers were investigating reports on July 11 of an “armed man who was acting erratically” when they encountered Mr. Mann, according to a police statement. Police dashboard video footage shows them chasing Mr. Mann with their patrol car as he fled on foot.
          “I am going to hit him,” one officer is heard saying. “Go for it,” another says. A voice then appears to say he was not going to “force it.”

          When the patrol car stopped, the officers ran after Mr. Mann and fired over a dozen times, according to the footage. He was later declared dead at a hospital.
          The video was one of three dashboard clips that the Police Department released on Sept. 20 after the shooting. But the case gained new attention after audio of the officers’ remarks were highlighted by The Sacramento News and Review and by The Sacramento Bee last week.
          The shooting has raised questions about the department’s tactics and the officers’ response to someone who appeared to be behaving erratically. Mr. Mann’s family has described him as being mentally ill.
          On Monday, Mr. Burris said he had sent a letter urging the Justice Department to investigate the Police Department and the officers’ use of a car “as a deadly weapon.” He wants the district attorney’s office to charge the officers, John Tennis and Randy Lozoya, with murder, and said that with the release of the audio information from the dashboard camera, he had updated a federal lawsuit filed more than a month ago that alleged the excessive use of force.
          Shelly Orio, a spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office, said in an email on Monday that the office was investigating the shooting.
          In his letter, Mr. Burris wrote that Officer Tennis had a “long history of disturbing behavior,” referring to an episode in 1997 in which a black man, Albert Thiel, 35, died after the officer placed him in a chokehold.
          A Sacramento Police Department spokesman, Officer Matthew McPhail, when asked in a telephone interview on Monday whether the two officers had previous discipline issues, said he did not have records immediately available.
          He said the two officers, who had more than 25 years on the force, had been taken off patrols and placed on modified duty. Citing the civil suit, he referred further questions to the city attorney, James Sanchez, who did not immediately return a telephone message seeking comment on Monday.
          In a statement on July 11, the Police Department said witnesses had reported a man with a knife, and one said the suspect had a firearm in his waistband. When officers arrived, they tried to “de-escalate” the situation, the statement said.
          Mr. Mann threw an object at one of the police vehicles following him, the authorities said. Officers shouted at him through the patrol car’s loudspeaker to “get on the ground,” put his hands in the air, stop walking and drop the knife.
          “Sir, we don’t want to hurt you; drop the knife,” an officer can be heard saying in one of the dashboard videos.
          The police statement said that Mr. Mann was “reaching for his waistband as if he was trying to retrieve a weapon” and that he charged at a police vehicle with a knife held above his head. After the officers chased him, he “turned back towards them, armed with a knife,” and they opened fire, the police said.
          Police Chief Sam Somers Jr. said at a news conference on Sept. 20 that the officers had fired 18 shots, 14 of which struck Mr. Mann, according to The Associated Press.
          A cellphone video posted on Mr. Burris’s YouTube channel shows Mr. Mann performing what looked like martial arts moves in the street as officers asked him to drop the knife. The lawyer said that the officers “had a right to respond,” but that Mr. Mann’s “odd maneuvers” reflected a person who was having mental and emotional problems.
          “That is the kind of assessment the officers should have made,” he said.



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          8)  When It Comes to Tax Avoidance, Donald Trump’s Just a Small Fry
          Andrew Ross Sorkin
          DEALBOOK 
          Not paying taxes “makes me smart,” Donald J. Trump said last week. His surrogates called him “a genius” for his recently revealed tax avoidance strategies.
          Well, if they are right, the executives running corporate America are absolute virtuosos.
          An exhaustive study being released on Tuesday by a group of researchers shows in detail how Fortune 500 companies have managed to shelter trillions of dollars in profits offshore from being taxed. Mr. Trump’s efforts pale by comparison. Worse, the companies have managed to hide many of their tax havens completely, in many cases reporting different numbers to different government agencies to obfuscate exactly how they’ve avoided Uncle Sam.
          And, yes, it is all legal.
          The immediate response from many readers may be ire for the companies avoiding taxes — or for Mr. Trump. But that’s not the goal of this particular column. In this case, that kind of thinking may even be counterproductive.
          Instead, the study — which notes that 58 Fortune 500 companies would owe $212 billion in additional federal taxes, “equal to the entire state budgets of California, Virginia and Indiana combined,” if they were taxed properly — should be a five-alarm call to voters and lawmakers to finally fix the tax system. If all the attention on Mr. Trump’s tax bill (or lack of one) isn’t enough to inspire a complete rewrite of the tax code, this study may be.
          The authors of the report, which include the U.S. PIRG Education Fundand Citizens for Tax Justice, combed through the filings of the Fortune 500 for 2015 and found an astonishing 73 percent “maintained subsidiaries in offshore tax havens.”
          Maybe it is to be expected. Companies and individuals complain bitterly that taxes are too high and the rules too complicated, but many corporations and the wealthiest members of our society have found ways to make the tax code work for them.
          If all the Fortune 500 companies paid taxes on their sheltered profits, the researchers tallied, the government would receive a whopping $717.8 billion windfall. To put that number in context, the 2015 federal budget deficit was $438 billion. However, fixing our corporate tax system alone isn’t the answer to reducing our red ink; it might only be a drop in the bucket given that our total federal debt is nearing $20 trillion.
          The researchers reported that Apple holds $214.9 billion offshore and would owe $65.4 billion in taxes if that money came back to the United States; Nike holds $10.7 billion offshore and would owe $3.6 billion in United States taxes; Goldman Sachs holds $28.6 billion offshore, and the report says the company “reports having 987 subsidiaries in offshore tax havens, 537 of which are in the Cayman Islands despite not operating a single legitimate office in that country, according to its own website.”
          Rather than moralize about whether it is patriotic to pay taxes — which seems to be a rather polarizing question these days — let’s focus on understanding exactly how companies keep money offshore and find an appealing way to bring back that money to help spur our economy and create jobs for those without them and higher incomes for those who do.
          It is worth noting that Apple’s recent $14.5 billion tax bill levied by the European Union, which contended that Ireland undertaxed the company, is a good example of money kept offshore to benefit from lower rates. Perhaps it is a twist of irony, but given the European Union’s efforts to collect — which Apple’s chief executive, Tim Cook, called “total political crap” — one question that has emerged is whether United States companies may be more inclined to bring money back home rather than risk shifting tax rules in Europe (think Brexit, for example) and elsewhere.
          Perhaps not surprisingly, it’s hard to figure out exact numbers for money stored abroad because there is so little transparency in how offshore profits are reported. So, the first element of making a better tax system is simply creating a more transparent way to report offshore profits so policy makers aren’t in an information vacuum.
          Here’s just one example of the problem: The Securities and Exchange Commission “only requires that companies report all ‘significant’ subsidiaries, based on multiple measures of a subsidiary’s share of the company’s total assets. By only requiring significant rather than all subsidiaries, this allows companies to get away with not disclosing many of their offshore subsidiaries and creates the potential for gaming because avoiding disclosure simply requires splitting a significant subsidiary into several smaller subsidiaries,” the report says.
          It also points out that “the penalties for not disclosing subsidiaries are so light” that it is very likely that companies choose to muddle the numbers and consider the potential for being fined simply the cost of doing business.
          The challenge of transparency is exemplified by this finding: “27 companies reported 16,389 total subsidiaries and 2,836 tax haven subsidiaries to the Federal Reserve, while only reporting 2,279 total subsidiaries and only 410 tax haven subsidiaries to the S.E.C.”
          How is that possible?
          It isn’t because these companies are lying to the S.E.C. (at least, not that we know about). It is because the S.E.C. has been so vague about the definitions of a subsidiary that it’s almost laughable. All agencies should require the same definitions; the Federal Reserve, for example, is much tougher.
          Once we have the actual information, we need to figure out what to do with it. No doubt, companies in the United States — and frankly any business that benefits from our markets — should pay some form of taxes. (Having said that, there are some economists who argue that corporate taxes should be very little or nothing at all — assuming that individuals and shareholders then pay more.)
          Citizens for Tax Justice advocates a litany of rules to end the deferral of foreign income, stop tax inversions and remove loopholes like inconsistent guidelines that allow companies to tell “one country that a subsidiary is a corporation while telling another country the same entity is a partnership or some other form.”
          These are laudable goals. How we resolve the disgraceful patchwork of tax rules and loopholes remains an open question. Democrats want policies that create more revenue, and Republicans want policies that create less revenue in the immediate term (they want lower tax rates and suggest that such rates would spur the economy and therefore ultimately create more revenue).
          Whatever the ultimate resolution, whoever ends up being the next president has the chance to be considered a true “genius” if he or she tackles the issue in a meaningful and sensible way.


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          9)  A Bill of Rights for Housecleaners
          By ISABEL ESCOBAR




          Chicago — For eight years, I worked as a housecleaner for a millionaire who lived in the Gold Coast neighborhood of Chicago. I took the bus across town three times a week, often to work in an empty house because my employer was frequently away, traveling for business.
          That also meant I got paid only when I saw him — in lump sums, often months apart. At first, I didn’t mind this setup, but soon, months would pass. By the end of 2008, my employer owed me $10,000 — and had stopped returning my calls.
          I was frantic. It wasn’t just that these were wages for weeks and weeks of work I’d already done, but I had bills to pay and my son’s tuition at a special high school.
          I went over to my employer’s place one day, hoping to confront him, and finally found him home. I asked when I’d get paid what I was owed. He didn’t answer, but instead offered a one-off payment of $1,000 to settle the debt. When I refused that, he told me to leave and, obviously assuming I was undocumented, threatened to have me deported. (In fact, I had legal status as a permanent resident on grounds of political asylum.)
          It wasn’t the first time I’d been treated like this. I’d been a housekeeper for more than a decade, after coming to Chicago from Guatemala in 1989 to escape the civil war. In general, the work wasn’t bad, though it was hard on my joints as I got older. I often felt I was learning new things, and I always took pride in maintaining clean and tidy homes for people.
          But I soon found out how some employers tried to take advantage of an immigrant with the broken English I spoke at the time. One woman wanted to pay me $60 for two full days of work — after we’d previously agreed on a higher amount. Another employer liked to leave pornographic magazines lying around after I started working for him.
          In any regular workplace, this type of behavior wouldn’t be tolerated. But for domestic workers like me, who do their jobs in the privacy of people’s homes, there isn’t much we can do. If we say something, we get fired.
          Which is why the Gold Coast millionaire probably thought I would just go away. But he was wrong. I took him to court.
          When I filed my wage theft lawsuit, I was shocked to learn how few rights I had under Illinois law. There are about two million domestic workers in the United States — people like me, who clean homes or care for children and seniors. Many of us are minority or immigrant women, and many work for less than minimum wage — either because domestic work is not covered by the federal labor laws or because domestic workers are also excluded from state protections and benefits.
          Fighting my lawsuit gradually turned me into an activist, and I began to speak out about my case. The more I did, the more I met other domestic workers who told me their stories; many had suffered worse mistreatment than I had. Taking inspiration from efforts in other states like California and New York to pass laws that protect the rights of domestic workers, we began campaigning for similar legislation in Illinois.
          It took awhile, but we won. In August, Illinois became the seventh state to adopt a law to protect our rights, joining Massachusetts, California, New York, Oregon, Hawaii and Connecticut.
          Under the Domestic Workers Bill of Rights, more than 35,000 housecleaners, nannies and home care workers in Illinois are fully covered by labor and human rights laws for the first time in the state’s history. Whether you’re paid in cash, or are undocumented, as a domestic worker you are now guaranteed a state minimum wage, protection from discrimination and sexual harassment, a meal break in every shift and a day of rest each week.
          The day of my final court date, my employer met me outside the courtroom and tried to make a final settlement. He raised his offer to $1,500. I said no, out of dignity for myself and for my work. Fortunately, I was vindicated because, a few minutes later, the judge ruled in my favor. But it had taken five long, grinding years to get justice. No one should have to go through that.
          That was why the day that Gov. Bruce Rauner signed the domestic workers bill into law meant so much to me. Housecleaners and care workers will no longer have to live in the shadows, enduring abusive situations, in Illinois.
          Employers will know that our work deserves respect, dignity and protection. And workers will know that the law is on our side.
          My job now is to see that every state in the country adopts a bill of rights like Illinois’.





          Isabel Escobar is a housecleaner, a board member of the advocacy group Arise Chicagoand a member of the National Domestic Workers Alliance.



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          10)  Toll Rises by Hour in Haiti Amid Ruin Left by Hurricane Matthew
          By AZAM AHMED

          LES CAYES, Haiti — A hospital now a shambles, its floors swamped with garbage and water, absent electricity. People living in the streets, camped in front of their broken homes. Buildings smashed into splinters. Farm fields flattened, portending a hard year ahead.
          “For me, Roche-à-Bateau is not a place to live anymore,” said Warens Jeanty, 26, a tourism operator surveying the beach towns and picturesque port hamlets that dot Haiti’s coast. “People have nowhere to stay.”
          As Haiti picks through the detritus left by Hurricane Matthew, more bodies are turning up every hour. Some estimates said that more than 800 people had died in the storm, more than double what the government has reported, though it acknowledged that the toll was unknown. In one part of the country’s southern peninsula, nearly 30,000 homes were destroyed and 150 lives lost, officials said.
          And a full accounting of damage has not even started.
          “I had never seen anything like this,” said Marie Yolene Gateau, a retired New York City guidance counselor who lives in Leogane, Haiti, a town that was largely flattened in the 2010 earthquake. Now the storm has wiped out most of the region’s sugar crop, bananas and mangoes, she said. “The hurricane was attacking the trees. I watched thinking, ‘When is it going to stop?’ ”

          Passage to many areas remained blocked, thwarting efforts to assess the destruction and to help survivors. A single remote village reported 82 dead on Friday, while others said they were waiting to account for dozens of missing people. The government, which requires visual proof to count a death in its toll, could hardly keep up with the accounts of loss stitched together from hospitals.
          “We’re still far from having a full picture of the extent of the damage,” said Marc Vincent, a Unicef representative in Haiti. “We are hoping for the best, but bracing for the worst.”
          It is a state that Haiti has grown accustomed to.
          The country was getting ready for elections this Sunday, the product of nearly a year of wrangling and recriminations. But after a long period of political uncertainty and delay, even nature would not let Haiti hold the vote.
          Now the hurricane has presented yet another hurdle to a nation still grappling with the devastation of the 2010 earthquake and a cholera epidemic inadvertently introduced to the country by United Nations peacekeepers.
          Etienne Navuson, 27, waited out the hurricane this week in his concrete home as the wind lashed his village on the southwestern peninsula. When he awoke, almost everything had vanished: cattle, crops, fields and homes.
          “Had the rain fallen more than it did — had it gone for just one more hour — we would have lost even more,” Mr. Navuson said.
          At least 90 percent of the village was destroyed, he said. Residents are searching for food and water buried in the rubble.
          “Those who find something are fortunate,” he said. Seven more family members have taken refuge in Mr. Navuson’s home after losing their own to the storm. The tiny home is now packed with people sleeping on plastic sheets for bedding.
          “There will be food shortages in the days to come,” Mr. Navuson said.
          Msgr. Pierre-André Pierre, the head of the Catholic University of Notre Dame of Haiti, encountered chaos when he reached the coastal town of Jérémie. Trees were gone, leaving an empty field. Someone had discarded a body in front of a Catholic bishop’s house, not knowing where else to dispose of it.
          “They were in a state of shock on what had happened in that place,” Monsignor Pierre said. “People were running in the streets.”
          The monsignor said he then took a flight to the southern part of the peninsula where he passed over the town of Roche-à-Bateau, where little was left.
          “That town did not exist,” he said.
          Jeff Barnes, a Haitian-American pilot, was making relief flights on Friday. Many of the towns around Jérémie remained cut off from the rest of Haiti. In some neighborhoods, 80 to 90 percent of homes had been severely damaged or destroyed.
          Swaths of trees had been reduced to stumps, he said. Large teams of young people had taken to the streets with machetes and chain saws, trying to clear roads blocked by fallen trees, some several feet in diameter.
          “Almost everyone is living under the sky now, sleeping under the stars,” he said. “Doors are gone, people don’t have a place to live.”
          Observers said that the hurricane and the lack of a coordinated response recalled the troubles the country faced during the 2010 earthquake.
          “It is during natural disasters such as this the frailty and near-absence of Haiti’s state becomes most visible,” said Michael Deibert, the author of two books on Haiti. “As the country slides downhill, the political elites squabble in the capital and the international community fails to come up with an effective way of engaging with Haiti’s most vulnerable.”
          Others agreed.
          “Haiti has been in the path of the storm just way too often,” said Robert E. Maguire, a professor of international affairs at George Washington University. “It isn’t because of anything the Haitian people are doing. It’s natural disasters exacerbated because of the way people have managed the country.”
          Policies that ordered or permitted the stripping of trees have left barren and scorched landscapes susceptible to mudslides. Poor development has left the country defenseless to hurricanes, without sea walls or other hard defenses to soften the blow.
          The nation’s politics, meanwhile, often brew their own type of disaster, leaving the country bereft of clearly elected leaders.
          The interim government is still assessing the damage. Haiti’s Civil Protection Force maintained on Friday that fewer than 300 people had died, but Reuters had tallied that nearly 900 lives were lost.
          In many areas, schools, police stations and other buildings that would typically serve as voting stations are in tatters. The hope of most is that the government will reschedule the elections for this year.
          “We will have another disaster here if these elections aren’t held this year,” said Pierre Esperance, the executive director of the National Human Rights Defense Network. “The interim government doesn’t really have the power or legitimacy to control the country.”
          For many, looking for food or still searching for loved ones, the elections were the last thing on their minds. On Friday, the Charmant Hotel in Jérémie had left a message on its website, saying its owners had not been in touch since the storm.
          “We do know that Bette and Edwin were taking precautions for their guests, staff and family prior to the hurricane,” said the message, left by staff members.
          Valery Numa, a well-known radio host in Port-au-Prince, ran three businesses — a hotel, a radio station and a Haitian Creole restaurant — in the town of Camp Perrin. All three were destroyed in the hurricane. But Mr. Numba has put an ambitious date, Nov. 1, for opening his three operations again.
          “Any businessman who loses everything is going to be in distress,” he said, adding that he found himself lucky that none of his family members had died.
          The aftermath of the storm also brought scenes of hope as survivors appeared. As the hurricane subsided, a team from St.-Boniface Hospital in southwestern Haiti went out to clear a route through debris. Looking up through the lessening rain, one of the workers saw the figure of a pregnant woman.
          Her name was Julienne Cadet. She had been walking for at least half a mile. She was bleeding, in active labor.
          The team quickly gathered around Ms. Cadet, helped her across a raging stream and drove her to the hospital. After an emergency cesarean section, she delivered two healthy boys: Jonas and Jean-atan.




          Jonathan M. Katz contributed reporting from Durham, N.C., Frances Robles from Titusville, Fla., and Nicholas Casey from New York.



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          11)  Seeing ‘Nothing to Live For’ as Haiti Seeks a Body Count After Hurricane Matthew
          By AZAM AHMED

          PORT-SALUT, Haiti — The loss in this coastal town is all but entire. Dead animals float in tidal pools. Cinder-block heaps mark where homes once stood. Trees, stripped of leaves, branches and tops, impale the earth like ragged posts.
          But the loss here runs deeper. The local hospital has registered 13 deaths since Hurricane Matthewflung 145-mile-per-hour winds and a wall of water at Port-Salut, but many more have died without so much as an official word.
          Emilien Clerveaux died trying to save his daughter, his head split open by flying debris. Elouse Maître’s aunt and four cousins were swept out to sea when the water claimed her beachfront shack. Destine Rosevald’s two children, 6 and 4, died in his arms as he tried to rush them to safety.

          “When I think about them, I cry,” Mr. Rosevald said as he stood in a neighbor’s yard on Saturday, water filling his eyes. “She was just in elementary school. My son, he was going to start kindergarten this year.”
          As access and information to cut-off areas of Haiti increase after the hurricane, the news only gets worse. The death toll has climbed to nearly 900 people, while an outbreak of cholera in three southern towns has killed 13 people and infected 62 others, health officials said.
          For now, though, there is no way to know the precise toll of the storm. There are still 500,000 people stranded in the south alone, officials said, because of extensive damage to an already feeble infrastructure. More than 170 people have been reported dead in Les Anglais, which for now is accessible only by helicopter.
          Just as the impoverished island nation, bereft of resources and capacity, struggled to prepare for the storm, the recovery has been hampered by the same shortcomings. And communications have been scattered. Although news outlets are reporting nearly 900 dead, the government has for two days insisted on a figure less than half of that.
          That gap is partly the result of how the deaths are reported. The government is counting only those it can verify, a formal process that cannot be completed until access to areas cut off by the storm is restored. But in towns like Port-Salut, many have already buried their dead or stopped searching for loved ones carried away in the storm surge.
          “Honestly, we don’t even know how many died,” said Sanite Moïse, seated with a group of women washing clothes in a shallow flood pool. Small children bathed in the murky water.
          Mrs. Moïse said her 77-year-old father had died a few days earlier, drowned in the floods that engulfed his home near the beach. When she went to look for him, there was nothing left — just an embankment and washed-up debris. The house, she said, was gone.
          “God gives and God takes,” she said with a shrug. “Mankind, for all the evil he does, could never do something like this.”
          The devastation in Port-Salut was hard to overestimate. Hardly a home was left untouched, and many were reduced to splinters and rocks. Fields fallowed by salt water baked in the afternoon heat, while palm trees the width of telephone poles were snapped in half.
          Periodically, the stench of death wafted through the tropical air, filling nostrils with a choking, rotten smell.
          The areas of Port-Salut farther west are the worst hit, with entire stretches of the waterfront washed away. Residents spoke about homes that used to line the picturesque beaches along with restaurants and shops.
          Standing by the side of the road, Mr. Rosevald barely registered the activity around him. As men brushed debris from the road and collected wood to reconstruct homes, he leaned against a rusted Mack truck, looking lost.
          He could not bear to be near his home, he said.
          When the storm hit, Mr. Rosevald tried to remain with his children and mother. But by late Monday, as the wind and rain belted his home, finally tearing off his roof, he decided to flee.
          He rushed to the front door but heard a crash in the living room and went running back. He found his 4-year-old son, Kendy, and his mother buried in the wreckage.
          He pulled them out and clutched his unconscious son at his waist, determined to get them out of the house. He lifted his daughter, Naomie, onto his shoulders and ran outside, his mother close behind.
          Almost immediately, a stick whirred through the air and struck the little girl in the ribs. Frightened by the force of the impact, he looked down at her but kept moving until they reached a neighbor’s house.
          By the next morning, both children were dead.
          His daughter, he said, was a playful and talkative girl in second grade. She loved math and jumping rope with friends. His son, he said, was a chatterbox and was excited to start kindergarten this year.
          Mr. Rosevald paused and apologized for not recalling everything clearly. “They tell me my daughter died a few hours later, at 6 a.m.,” he said. The force of the blow caused extensive internal bleeding, he said.
          “My son, they said, was dead the entire time I was carrying him,” he stuttered. The boy was dead the instant the wall fell on him.
          On Saturday, residents cleaned up wooden debris that littered the town, working with machetes and axes and stacking trees and branches felled in the storm. Fisherman repaired their nets on the beach.
          The water was postcard Caribbean.
          At the local hospital, the injured turned up by the dozens. An old man was carried from the bed of a truck into the waiting room, unconscious, as nurses and doctors trained in Cuba attended to him.
          A young girl issued bloodcurdling screams as nurses cleaned cuts running up her leg. A young man beside her gingerly touched deep gashes on the back of his neck.
          “I knew this place before,” Orthela Genima, a doctor who has worked in the hospital for several years, said of the town. “Now I can’t even recognize it.”
          Among those who had lost loved ones, many struggled to recognize even themselves.
          “It’s like we are slowly dying,” said Micheline Clerveaux, 18, whose father, Emilien, died Tuesday afternoon. “We have nothing to live for.”
          The family was gathered near where its house had been, an area reduced to a mound of stones and an odd assortment of furniture, a dismantled speaker and a wooden box spring. Mr. Clerveaux was buried in the family grave beside the home, a concrete slab sitting above ground, painted a dull blue.
          He had been searching for Micheline when the storm raged on Tuesday morning. The family had fled the home moments earlier, seeking refuge in an open field to the west.
          The parents split up, and Micheline and her sister, Francise, went with their father. The other four children went with their mother, Marie Rose Jacob.
          But when they met in the field and lay flat on the ground to avoid the flying objects, Micheline was missing. A strong gust had knocked her off course, placing her closer to a neighbor’s house.
          “He told me he was going to look for her,” Mrs. Jacob said.
          After an hour, the children and their mother left the field and, by good fortune, found shelter in the same home where Micheline was taking cover. But Mr. Clerveaux was not there.
          They waited until the worst of the storm had passed and went searching for him. Hours passed. Eventually, a few hundred yards away, they found him leaning against a tree, talking to himself.
          They hoisted him and looked for injuries. There was a huge wound on the back of his head. At home, lying in bed, he told his wife that he was going to die.
          A few hours later, he did.
          Mr. Clerveaux was a subsistence farmer, growing corn, potatoes and beans to feed his family. Those crops are now gone, unlikely to grow again in the salt water marsh that his land has been turned into. The family’s livestock — a cow and three sheep — are also lost.
          Neighbors pitched in to bury Mr. Clerveaux, and they are housing and feeding his wife and children. They say they will continue for however long it takes the family to rebuild.
          “If we survive, they will survive,” said Jean-Robert Nazaire, 56, the neighbor with whom the family took shelter during the storm. “If we have only one loaf of bread to eat, we will share it with them.”


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          12)  Why Care at Native American Hospitals Is Often Substandard
          By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS




          SIOUX FALLS, S.D. — The internal watchdog of the Health and Human Services Department says the often substandard quality of care at hospitals serving Native Americans is the result of outdated equipment and technology, lack of resources, and difficulty attracting and keeping skilled staff.
          The Office of Inspector General on Friday released two reports that looked into the longstanding challenges of the 28 hospitals directly operated by the federal Indian Health Service. The office, which acknowledged that reports of inadequate health care services for Native Americans had been of concern to the federal government for almost a century, criticized the agency’s limited oversight regarding compliance with federal regulations and quality of care, detailing how the agency’s regional administrators had few sources of information to assess the services provided at the hospitals.
          The Indian Health Service, commonly referred to as I.H.S., is responsible for providing health care services to enrolled tribal members as part of the government’s treaty obligations to Native American tribes. But the agency has faced challenges for decades, and within the past year has been under increased scrutiny from Congress after inspections of hospitals in the Great Plains uncovered severe deficiencies.
          The inspector general’s office said that the Indian Health Service’s eight regional offices conducted activities to monitor the quality of the hospitals, but that those efforts were minimal in some areas.
          One of the reports stated that the primary source of information that the regional offices used to detect quality problems was a small number of complaints and patient-harm reports.
          “However, according to hospital administrators, most patient complaints relate to customer service and wait times, rather than medical care,” according to the report. “Further, most hospitals (20 of 28) receive fewer than 100 complaints per year for inpatient and outpatient visits combined, averaging about one complaint per 1,000 patient visits.”
          The report continued: “Considering the quantity and subject matter of complaints and patient harm reports, they are unlikely to provide hospital staff with the breadth of information needed to identify and diagnose systemic quality or compliance breakdowns.”
          The inspector general’s office, which gathered the information for the reports from April 2014 to October 2014, also said that only half of the regional offices conducted mock inspection surveys that provided insight to quality practices.
          The watchdog also faulted the health service for staggering findings of outdated hospitals and the process taking several weeks that job applicants had to follow, even when one in three physicians jobs was open at the time the information for the reports was gathered.
          According to the report, in 15 of the 28 hospitals, administrators reported that aging or inadequate physical environments affected their ability to give quality care. Corroded pipes in one hospital caused sewage to leak into the operating room.
          The Indian Health Service had been under scrutiny for more than a year after inspectors from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services found several quality-of-care deficiencies at hospitals in South Dakota and Nebraska. At one hospital, the alarming conditions of its emergency room led officials to close it for seven months.
          The, watchdog, the inspector general office, on Friday recommended that inspectors survey Native American health facilities more frequently.
          In a statement on Friday, the health service concurred with inspector general recommendations, including the need for more training for staff and new ways to monitor hospital quality.
          The agency also said it began a mock survey initiative at 26 hospitals in May to assess compliance with the standards that hospitals must meet to be able to participate in the Medicare program.

          The statement also said a team was formed in February “to ensure that dependable, quality care is delivered consistently across I.H.S. facilities.”


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          13)  Queens Prosecutor Releases 71-Page Report on a Fatal Police Shooting
          By RICK ROJAS and ALAN FEUER



          When a New York City police officer uses lethal force, prosecutors routinely examine the circumstances leading up to the death and whether the officer had operated lawfully. Often what they release to the public is limited to a brief statement saying whether they had decided to press charges. Or, if the matter is taken to a grand jury, the process is cloaked in secrecy.
          But on Friday, the Queens district attorney’s office took the unusual step of making public a lengthy, detailed report of what investigators discovered in an officer-involved killing earlier this year.
          Richard A. Brown, the district attorney, announced that there was no basis for criminal charges against the officers who fatally shot a 32-year-old man, who the authorities said was armed, in South Ozone Park on April 17. With the announcement, Mr. Brown’s office released a 71-page document outlining the investigation into the shooting of the man, George Tillman. It included accounts from police officers, emergency workers and witnesses at the scene, as well as details about the evidence recovered by investigators.
          The release of the report was apparently intended to address the mounting calls for more transparency in reviews of police-involved shootings. Some have praised the move as a step toward changing a process that has been criticized for its secrecy, which often leaves lingering doubts over how and whether police officers were held accountable.
          “These cases get a lot of public attention and interest,” said Jonathan Moore, the lawyer who represented the family of Eric Garner, who died in 2014 after he was wrestled to the ground by police officers on Staten Island, in a civil suit against the city. “If you’re not going forward with the case, it’s a good idea to explain why. More information is always better than less.”
          The report comes as law enforcement in New York and around the country face heightened racial tensions over the deaths of black men at the hands of the police. It also follows a failed effort by activists to unseal the transcripts of the grand jury hearings at which the officer who placed Mr. Garner in a chokehold was not charged, and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s executive order appointing the state attorney general as a special prosecutor in police-related civilian deaths.
          In the early morning hours of April 17, Mr. Tillman, an electrical lineman visiting from Maryland, was stopped by plainclothes officers who spotted him standing by his S.U.V. with an open bottle of vodka in his hand, according to the report. The officers told Mr. Tillman, who was black, that he could not have the open bottle out and that he was not in a condition to drive. Mr. Tillman handed the bottle to a friend, and the officers began to leave without arresting him.
          Then, the report said, one of the officers saw what looked like a gun in his waistband and tried to talk to him. Mr. Tillman took off running, holding his waist with his right hand. He ignored calls to stop, and other officers who were in the area joined the pursuit.
          He turned to his left and pointed the weapon at an officer. Four officers opened fire, hitting him several times; the medical examiner found that he was killed by a shot to his left temple. The weapon he carried, prosecutors said, was “a loaded and operable” .40-caliber semiautomatic pistol.
          The officers involved in the shooting were not named in the report, but they were identified by police officials as Michael Renna, Mateusz Krzeminski, Kenneth Stallone and Sgt. Thomas Sorrentino. (In a statement, the Police Department said the officers “performed appropriately under the circumstances and the findings of the Queens district attorney’s office affirmed the justification of their actions.”)
          In his own statement, Mr. Brown, the district attorney, said that “any fair and reasonable person would agree that to bring criminal proceedings against the officers would be totally unwarranted.”
          “The officers had no choice,” he added, “but to fire in order to stop Mr. Tillman from firing his weapon at them.”
          Mr. Tillman’s family, in a statement issued by their lawyer, Jeffrey Lichtman, disagreed with the prosecutor’s findings and argued that the officers should face a trial.
          “Only a jury can help us understand why a father of five, a licensed electrician being investigated for an open container, can get shot 11 times — without getting a shot off — after allegedly pulling a gun on police officers,” the family’s statement said. “It made no sense when it happened and it still makes no sense today.”
          Mr. Tillman’s case is not the first in which officials have released detailed information about a police shooting.
          In 2014, the St. Louis County prosecutor, Robert P. McCulloch, released a trove of documents that had been considered by the grand jury before it declined to indict Officer Darren Wilson in the fatal shooting of Michael Brown.
          Twenty years earlier, the Brooklyn district attorney, Charles J. Hynes, held a news conference at which he explained why he would not prosecute Officer Brian George for the fatal shooting of Nicholas Heyward Jr., a 13-year-old who was carrying a toy gun. Mr. Hynes carefully explained to reporters the evidence his office had collected: Officer George was patrolling a dimly lit stairwell when he saw the boy with what he thought was a real weapon; he said he had even heard two clicks.
          Such disclosures by officials, including the Queens district attorney’s report on the Tillman case, are notably rare. (A spokesman for Mr. Brown declined on Friday to comment on why he had released the report.)
          “I’ve never heard of anything like that in New York in the past,” said Scott Rynecki, a lawyer for the family of Akai Gurley, who was shot and killed two years ago by an officer in the stairwell of a Brooklyn housing project. Often, Mr. Rynecki said, prosecutors “issue a decline-to-prosecute note and nothing more.”

          “It sounds to me like the Queens D.A. is trying to justify its decision, maybe to quell issues that might arise with groups that may be upset with it,” Mr. Rynecki added. “I have to tell you, though, it’s something I wouldn’t mind seeing in every case.”


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          14)  Selling Shampoo, Eye Cream and a Chemical Crackdown
          Revalued
          By  DAVID GELLES 
          The last time Congress thoroughly overhauled the regulation of personal care products like cosmetics and shampoo, World War II had not yet begun.
          Nearly 80 years later, personal care is a multibillion-dollar business, and many of the ingredients used in soaps and face creams are complex — and potentially dangerous — chemical compounds. But the laws on the books have not kept up with the times: If a shampoo makes your hair fall out, no government agency can easily compel a recall.
          That could change soon. Legislation that would introduce a far more serious degree of regulatory oversight to the personal care products industry is proceeding in the Senate and the House of Representatives. Consumer safety groups are pushing for stricter laws. And the call for more stringent oversight of the industry is coming from a coalition of companies that includes Beautycounter, a plucky start-up that is pitching natural face creams as well as regulation.
          Beautycounter is the brainchild of Gregg Renfrew, a retail executive who has embraced the cause of cleaner cosmetics. In 2006, after a career working with women including Martha Stewart and Susie Hilfiger, Ms. Renfrew watched “An Inconvenient Truth,” the Al Gore documentary on global warming. “It was an incredible wake-up call for me,” she said.
          Her newfound environmental consciousness soon extended beyond the gas pump. Before long she was trying to rid her home of potentially harmful toxins wherever they might lurk. She tossed her nonstick frying pans and bought stainless steel replacements; threw out plastic containers, preferring glass; and started using natural cleaning products.
          But when she went to her bathroom vanity, she was flummoxed. “I couldn’t find skin care or other beauty products that were safer but also performed well,” she said.
          So Ms. Renfrew says she decided to create products that would satisfy her needs. In 2010, she raised money and hired a team that included makeup artists and public health specialists.
          But as they began developing products, they identified more than 1,500 chemicals and ingredients they thought might be harmful or linked to cancer, and they resolved not to use them in Beautycounter products, they said. The “never list,” posted on the Beautycounter website, includes unsavory substances like the preservative formaldehyde, the synthetic antioxidants BHA and BHT, and the skin-lightening chemical hydroquinone.
          Ms. Renfrew says she was surprised that so many of these potentially harmful ingredients could legally be used in personal care products. The problem was that there had not been a major update to the federal laws overseeing the business since 1938.
          “Consumers are demanding cleaner and safer products, but we still have this law from almost 100 years ago,” said Bryan McGannon, policy director of the American Sustainable Business Council, a trade group.
          In March 2013, Beautycounter began offering its first nine products, including face cleanser, eye cream and shampoo. Instead of trying to distribute through traditional retail channels, Beautycounter took a page from Avon and chose a direct sales model, relying on an army of mostly women who sold the products to their peers.
          Today, Beautycounter offers nearly 100 products and has more than 25,000 people known as consultants who sell its wares. The company also sells its cosmetics through Goop, J. Crew and Target. Beautycounter says its sales are increasing rapidly.
          As the company grew, Ms. Renfrew kept one eye on Washington. In 2014, she hired Lindsay Dahl, an environmental advocate, to lead the company’s lobbying efforts, and she started strengthening alliances with nonprofit groups including the Breast Cancer Fund, Healthy Child Healthy World and the Environmental Working Group.
          Meanwhile, the cosmetics regulation attracted bipartisan support on Capitol Hill, and last year Senators Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, and Susan Collins, Republican of Maine, introduced the Personal Care Products Safety Act. If passed, it would give the Food and Drug Administration the authority to test ingredients and issue mandatory recalls for products deemed unsafe.
          “Our skin is our largest organ, and it quickly absorbs the chemicals in personal care products,” Ms. Feinstein said in a statement. “With increasing evidence that certain ingredients in these products are linked to health concerns, ranging from reproductive disorders to cancer, there is an urgent need to update the 80-year-old law designed to ensure they are safe.”
          In the House, a bipartisan pair of representatives from New Jersey has introduced draft legislation that could become a companion bill. Last month, the Senate held its first hearing on the issue.
          Beautycounter does not claim responsibility for getting the legislation on track. Ms. Feinstein has been studying the issue for at least eight years and working on the current bill for three years. Other companies, including Seventh Generation, the Honest Company and even big corporations like Johnson & Johnson and Procter & Gamble, have also embraced the prospect of tighter regulation.
          But Beautycounter has been among the most persistent, and vocal, advocates of change. In May, Ms. Renfrew took 100 women to Washington for several days of meetings with senators and staff from both sides of the aisle.
          “Beautycounter has really invested in the process in a different way,” Mr. McGannon said. “It isn’t often when you have companies willing to stand up and say: We’re O.K. with more regulation. We need it.”
          Several recent fiascoes have added a sense of urgency to the issue. One of the most prominent examples was when users of Wen, a hair treatment promoted by the stylist Chaz Dean, reported hair loss.
          Wen, Mary Kay and other independent cosmetics companies, as well as the Independent Cosmetic Manufacturers and Distributors, a trade group, oppose the Personal Care Products Safety Act. They support legislation that critics say would not go nearly far enough to bring real oversight to an industry with lax consumer protections.
          It might seem as if the battle lines have already been drawn. But in a twist, Beautycounter has not endorsed the Personal Care Products Safety Act, saying that while it is a good start, it is insufficient.
          The proposed legislation would require the Food and Drug Administration to test only five ingredients each year. With the European Union having banned or restricted more than a thousand ingredients, Ms. Renfrew says that is woefully inadequate.
          And the bill does little to promote supply chain transparency. In its current incarnation, it would not require companies to reveal much about where they acquire raw materials or other ingredients.
          Strange as it might sound in a gridlocked Washington, it appears that some version of the Personal Care Products Safety Act could pass next year. But what shape a final bill might take is not clear.
          For now, Ms. Renfrew is still lobbying. “We’re thrilled that the bill has been introduced,” she said. “We’d like to see it strengthened.”


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          15)  South African Priest Injured in Student Protest
          By MEGAN SPECIA


          Images of the South African priest, bloodied by a rubber bullet as he stood in front of his church during a student protest, spread quickly on social media, far beyond his country’s borders.
          “I had presumed they would recognize that it was a bad mistake to shoot a robed clergyman at the church gates,” the priest, the Rev. Graham Pugin, said on Tuesday, a day after he was struck in the face.
          The episode came after a peaceful student protest at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg turned violent on Monday. According to eyewitness accounts, students threw rocks and the police responded with rubber bullets and tear gas.
          Some students fled to the grounds of the nearby Holy Trinity Catholic Church as the police cleared the streets. The police gave chase and the students tried to hide behind a low wall. That was when Mr. Pugin, a Jesuit, seen on video, stepped between a police vehicle attempting to enter church property and the students. The vehicle retreated, but the police fired rubber bullets and he was hit.
          Pictures of blood streaming from his nose onto his beard and down the front of his white robes spread quickly on social media and brought international attention to the demonstrations.

          The protest was the latest in a nationwide movement, called Fees Must Fall, in which students are demanding an end to university tuition. Some say the rising costs for higher education disproportionately affect poor, black students, and they want the government to fully cover the cost.



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          16)  Police Use Surveillance Tool to Scan Social Media, A.C.L.U. Says
          By JONAH ENGEL BROMWICH, DANIEL VICTOR and MIKE ISAAC

          A Chicago company has marketed a tool using text, photos and videos gleaned from major social media companies to aid law enforcement surveillance of protesters, civil liberties activists say.
          The company, called Geofeedia, used data from Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, as well as nine other social media networks, to let users search for social media content in a specific location, as opposed to searching by words or hashtags that would be less likely to reveal an exact location.
          Geofeedia marketed its abilities to law enforcement agencies and has signed up more than 500 such clients, according to an email obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union. In one document posted by the organization, as part of a report released on Tuesday, the company appears to point to how officials in Baltimore, with Geofeedia’s help, were able to monitor and respond to the violent protests that broke out after Freddie Gray died in police custody in April 2015.
          Geofeedia appears to have used programs that Facebook, Twitter and other social media companies offered that allow app makers or advertising companies to create third-party tools, like ways for publishers to see where their stories are being shared on social media.
          Facebook, Twitter and Instagram say they have cut off Geofeedia’s access to their information. But civil liberties advocates criticized the companies for lax oversight and challenged them to create better mechanisms to monitor how their data is being used.
          “These platforms should be doing more to protect the free speech rights of activists of color,” Matt Cagle, a lawyer with the A.C.L.U. in Northern California, said in an interview. “When they open their feeds to companies that market surveillance products, they risk putting their users in harm’s way.”

          Instagram and Facebook terminated Geofeedia’s access to their data in September, while Twitter shut off access on Tuesday. The response from the companies suggested that Geofeedia was using data from the companies in a way that was not allowed under their developer agreements.
          Jodi Seth, director of policy communications at Facebook, said that Geofeedia had access to data that had been made public on the social network, and that access was subject to the limitations in its platform policy. That policy asks developers to “provide a publicly available and easily accessible privacy policy that explains what data you are collecting and how you will use that data.”
          It also asks that they “obtain adequate consent from people before using any Facebook technology that allows us to collect and process data about them.”
          Twitter said that based on the information found by the A.C.L.U., it was “immediately suspending Geofeedia’s commercial access to Twitter data.”
          Phil Harris, chief executive of Geofeedia, said in a statement that his company “provides some clients, including law enforcement officials across the country, with a critical tool in helping to ensure public safety while protecting civil rights and liberties.” He said the firm has policies to prevent “inappropriate use of our software.”
          Mr. Harris added that the company understands that given how quickly digital technology changes, Geofeedia “must continue to work to build on these critical protections of civil rights.”
          In addition to law enforcement agencies, the company has marketed its services to journalists as a way to find people at breaking news events for interviews and social media content. The New York Times used Geofeedia on a trial basis, but has not had access since 2015.
          The A.C.L.U. said it first learned about the agreements with Geofeedia from responses to public records requests to 63 law enforcement agencies in California. Those records, the organization said, revealed a significant expansion of social media surveillance.
          “Posts on social media platforms can reveal information about our location, our religion, the people we associate with,” Mr. Cagle said. “Users of social media websites do not expect or want the government to be monitoring this information. And users should not be at risk of being branded a risk to public safety simply for speaking their mind on social media.”


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