Tag: police state

FBI Contractor Created Fake Online IDs to Join Chatrooms Run by Groups Organizing Against Vaccine Mandates

An FBI surveillance contractor infiltrated the chatrooms of two airline industry groups opposed to vaccine mandates to collect intelligence on the groups’ organizing activities, investigative journalist Lee Fang reported.

The contractor, Flashpoint, which in the past infiltrated Islamic terror groups, now focuses on “anti-vaccine” groups and other domestic political organizations, according to Fang.

In a webinar presentation for clients last year, which Fang analyzed on his Substack, Flashpoint analyst Vlad Cuiujuclu demonstrated his company’s methods for identifying and entering encrypted Telegram chat groups.

He explained how the company attempted to join chatrooms of transportation workers resisting the COVID-19 vaccine mandates.

Fang described the presentation:

“‘In this case, we’re searching for a closed channel of U.S. Freedom Flyers,’ said Cuiujuclu. ‘It’s basically a group that opposed vaccination and masks.’

“As he clicked through a database, Cuiujuclu showed a chat group on Telegram sponsored by Airline Professionals For Justice, another group formed by airline industry workers opposed to the mandate. The forum, he added, provided useful insights, including Zoom links for meetings of the grassroots organization.

“‘Private chats,’ said Cuiujuclu, ‘require for you to have an invite link,’ which he noted can often either be found by scrolling through public forums or by ‘engag[ing] the admin of that channel.’”

Flashpoint also offers clients artificial intelligence and internet scraping tools.

According to Fang, the firm is a leader in the “threat intelligence industry,” a growing number of security and surveillance firms that create fake online identities to infiltrate Discord chats, WhatsApp groups, Reddit forums and dark web message boards to gather information for clients, including corporations and the FBI, to monitor potential threats.

Joshua Yoder, president of US Freedom Flyers, said he is aware that Flashpoint infiltrated private chat groups associated with his organization.

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Vermont bans owning, running paramilitary training camps

Vermont on Monday made it a crime to own or operate paramilitary training camps in the state after Republican Gov. Phil Scott signed legislation introduced in response to a firearms training facility built without permits that neighbors called a menace.

Violators face up to five years in prison or a fine up to $50,000 or both, according to the law. It prohibits a person from teaching, training, or demonstrating to anyone else the use, application, or making of a firearm, explosive, or incendiary device capable of causing injury or death that will be used in or in furtherance of a civil disorder. It also bans a person from assembling with others for such training, instruction or practice.

The gun violence prevention group led by former U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, of Arizona, who was forced to give up her political career when she was disabled in a 2011 assassination attempt, praised Vermont’s law.

“Today, Vermont joins 25 other states that prohibit firearms training for anti-government paramilitary activity,” said Allison Anderman, senior counsel and the leader of Giffords’ Guns & Democracy project. “Private paramilitary activity is illegal in Vermont and has been associated with the intimidation of people exercising their constitutional rights across the US,” she said by email. “This is a commonsense policy that will help reduce the spread of dangerous, illegal, and anti-government firearms intimidation.”

The Vermont law does not apply to legitimate law enforcement activity or lawful activity by Norwich University or any other educational institution where military science is taught. it also doesn’t apply to self-defense instruction or practice without the intent of causing a civil disorder; firearms instruction that is intended to teach the safe handling and use of firearms; and any lawful sports or activities like hunting, target shooting and firearms collection.

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New York City Calls The Cops On Unruly Elementary Schoolers Hundreds of Times Each Year

Each year, police are called thousands of times to New York City schools over incidents where children become emotionally distressed or disruptive. In 2022, according to a new investigation published jointly by ProPublica and THE CITY, schools called police 560 times to deal with children under 10 years old. Even when they don’t threaten themselves or others, these children are frequently restrained by police or sent to local hospitals. Some of these children have been as young as four years old.

According to THE CITY reporter Abigail Kramer, New York City public school employees called the police on emotionally distressed students 2,656 times in 2022. In five incidents, school employees called the police on four-year-olds. While black students only make up 25 percent of New York City schools’ population, they comprise 46 percent of “child in crisis” police calls and 59 percent of the students who are handcuffed at school.

While New York City schools policy dictates that a police call should only be used as a last resort, parents told Kramer that school officials used these calls to punish unruly students who were not posing a legitimate safety threat. Further, these parents claimed that police calls frequently ended with their children—many of whom have developmental disabilities—being taken to local hospitals despite no medical emergencies occurring, leading to expensive medical bills.

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The Four Pillars of Medical Ethics Were Destroyed in the Covid Response

Much like a Bill of Rights, a principal function of any Code of Ethics is to set limits, to check the inevitable lust for power, the libido dominandi, that human beings tend to demonstrate when they obtain authority and status over others, regardless of the context.

Though it may be difficult to believe in the aftermath of COVID, the medical profession does possess a Code of Ethics. The four fundamental concepts of Medical Ethics – its 4 Pillars – are Autonomy, Beneficence, Non-maleficence, and Justice.

Autonomy, Beneficence, Non-maleficence, and Justice

These ethical concepts are thoroughly established in the profession of medicine. I learned them as a medical student, much as a young Catholic learns the Apostle’s Creed. As a medical professor, I taught them to my students, and I made sure my students knew them. I believed then (and still do) that physicians must know the ethical tenets of their profession, because if they do not know them, they cannot follow them.

These ethical concepts are indeed well-established, but they are more than that. They are also valid, legitimate, and sound. They are based on historical lessons, learned the hard way from past abuses foisted upon unsuspecting and defenseless patients by governments, health care systems, corporations, and doctors. Those painful, shameful lessons arose not only from the actions of rogue states like Nazi Germany, but also from our own United States: witness Project MK-Ultra and the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment.

The 4 Pillars of Medical Ethics protect patients from abuse. They also allow physicians the moral framework to follow their consciences and exercise their individual judgment – provided, of course, that physicians possess the character to do so. However, like human decency itself, the 4 Pillars were completely disregarded by those in authority during COVID.

The demolition of these core principles was deliberate. It originated at the highest levels of COVID policymaking, which itself had been effectively converted from a public health initiative to a national security/military operation in the United States in March 2020, producing the concomitant shift in ethical standards one would expect from such a change. As we examine the machinations leading to the demise of each of the 4 Pillars of Medical Ethics during COVID, we will define each of these four fundamental tenets, and then discuss how each was abused.

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No drugs, no arrest – but bounty of cash for Mobile County Sheriff’s Office

You don’t have to be convicted of a crime for law enforcement to take your money or property. You don’t even need to be charged with one.

The procedure is known as civil asset forfeiture, which allows authorities to take cash and property that they can demonstrate was used in criminal activity or was illicit profits. The latest example in Mobile County occurred April 26 on Interstate 10 in Grand Bay when deputies pulled over an 18-wheeler and seized hundreds of thousands of dollars – despite making no arrests.

The practice has drawn fierce criticism in Alabama and across the country, which some going as far as labeling it “legalized theft.”

Mobile County Sheriff Paul Burch said his agency does not seize property without substantial evidence that it is connected to criminal enterprises.

“We don’t do so lightly,” he told FOX10 News. “And we work within the laws that are provided.”

During the stop last month, Burch said the deputy – assigned to a special operations unit and specially trained to spot possible drug couriers – noticed a discrepancy in the vehicle’s Department of Transportation number.

A search did not turn up any drugs, but a K-9 dog did alert on cash inside the truck – $323,000. The Sheriff’s Office seized it as suspected drug money. Now, it is on the driver to make a claim to try to get the money back.

“He has a right to do so,” Burch said. “And there’s a process for it. But we typically don’t make those type of seizures unless, you know, there’s a strong basis to do so.”

Burch said most people do not try to get it back because if it was ill-gotten, they do not want to draw attention from law enforcement. He would not go into all of the evidence in this case but said there a joint investigation with the Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. Border Patrol into drug smuggling.

Both federal and state law enforcement agencies routinely seize money and cash unconnected to criminal charges. FOX10 News recently highlighted a case in which Mobile police seized a vehicle – and already had sold it by the time a judge dismissed criminal charges against the driver. The civil case is set for a hearing soon in Mobile County Circuit Court.

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DHS Producing Videos Teaching Citizens How To Identify “Radicalized” Conservatives

America First Legal (AFL) has obtained documents through FOIA request from the Department of Homeland Security which outline a “Choose Your Own Adventure” style video series that DHS intended to release to the public.  The videos were meant to depict different scenarios in which citizens might encounter potentially “radicalized” individuals.  Citizens are then asked to choose what they think should be done about the encounter. 

Most of the scripted scenarios showcase people with conservative beliefs and values as the radicalized threat.  For example, the DHS targeted “suburban Moms” with pro-life beliefs.

The series also targeted “old high school friends” who believe in “conspiracies” as examples of radicalized citizens in need of bystander intervention.

The video scripts, written under the DHS’s Office of Terrorism and Violence Prevention, was part of an internalized memo circulated on January 29th, 2021, only eight days after Joe Biden entered the White House.  The program seems to have been developed in tandem with the “Disinformation Governance Board” which was eventually scrapped due to public opposition.  It reveals an ongoing and disturbing trend within the Federal Government to implement authoritarian measures across the country, first using covid as an excuse, then using the January 6th protests as a rationale.

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DHS Official Gets Life for Using His Federal Authority to Rape, Abuse, and Then Silence Women Victims

In a chilling example of a trusted government official abusing his power to carry out his depravity, a disgraced special agent with Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) was sentenced to life in federal prison for sexually assaulting two women and leveraging his official position to prevent them from reporting his violent conduct. John Jacob Olivas, 48, of Riverside, California, was found guilty of three counts of deprivation of rights under color of law and sentenced to life in prison this week.

It is worth noting that while HSI had individuals like Olivas in their ranks raping women and silencing them, Homeland Security was busy referring to people who questioned the COVID lockdowns as “domestic terrorists.” This disturbing irony highlights the immense power and authority that comes with law enforcement positions and their ability to demonize the innocent while hell unfolds within their ranks.

Olivas sought out a position of authority and used it to prey on women, violating their constitutional rights while abusing them sexually. According to victim testimony, he made it clear to his victims that the police would not be responsive to any report they made about him due to his status as a federal agent. He even threatened them with retaliation, such as making them “disappear,” having their children taken away, and getting them arrested on fake criminal charges.

One victim testified that Olivas tried to rape her “after making it clear to her that the police would not be responsive to any report she would make about Olivas because he was ‘above a cop,’ and ‘untouchable’ and ‘invisible’ to police” because of his federal position, the U.S. attorney’s office statement said.

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Texas Lawmakers Advance Bill To Raise Age For Buying Semiautomatic Rifles To 21

Texas state lawmakers advanced a bill on Tuesday that seeks to raise the minimum age to purchase a semiautomatic rifle to 21, just days after a mass shooting in Allen.

Two Republicans on the House Select Committee on Community Safety joined the committee’s Democrats to approve moving House Bill 2744 to the full chamber for a vote. This move is seen as a small victory for gun control advocates despite the bill being unlikely to pass the conservative Legislature and become law.

Reps. Sam Harless from Spring and Justin Holland from Rockwall, both Republicans, voted with Democrats on the last day of the bill’s deadline to move out of committee and continue through the legislative process. Their support came as a surprise, notably with Holland’s previous strong pro-Second Amendment stance.

The bill has been widely criticized by Republicans and gun rights advocates as infringing on the constitutional rights of law-abiding adults. Opponents of the bill have argued that if an 18-year-old is considered an adult with respect to voting, purchasing tobacco, and serving in the military, then it should entitle them to the full rights to protections granted by the U.S. Constitution.

The unexpected vote came just days after a gunman killed eight people, including several children, at a mall in Allen, Texas. Harless described his decision as “the most emotional vote” he’s ever taken, The New York Times reported. “I started crying after I made it. That means my heart told me I made the right vote,” he said.

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New York’s Heavy Hand Keeps Illegal Marijuana and Tobacco Dealers in Business

While I have fond memories of life in New York, many of them involve defying some stupid rule or regulation. It’s a pleasure to now live in Arizona where government, while still idiotic, generally has a lighter touch. Unfortunately for friends and family I left behind, Empire State officialdom still hasn’t learned its lessons, as evidenced by the heavy regulatory hand stifling sort-of-legalized marijuana, and proposals to similarly reinforce the black market with an outright ban on cigarette sales.

“Governor Kathy Hochul today signed new legislation to increase civil and tax penalties for the unlicensed and illicit sale of cannabis in New York as part of the FY 2024 Budget,” the New York governor’s office announced this week. “The legislation, first proposed by the Governor in March, provides additional enforcement power to the Office of Cannabis Management and the Department of Taxation and Finance to enforce the new regulatory requirements and close stores engaged in the illegal sale of cannabis.”

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Video showed cop trying to stop his partner from killing a man. Police investigators never even asked about the footage.

In the spring of 2019, two New York City Police Department officers entered the Bronx apartment of Kawaski Trawick. The 32-year-old personal trainer and dancer had called 911 after locking himself out.

But 112 seconds after their arrival, footage showed, one of the officers shot and killed Trawick, despite the officer’s more-experienced partner repeatedly telling him not to use force.

When an internal investigation later cleared the officers — saying “no wrongdoing was found” — the NYPD offered no explanation for its reasoning. But records obtained by ProPublica can now reveal how the department came to that conclusion.

Investigators never explored key exchanges between the two officers in the run-up to the shooting. They also never followed up with the officers when their accounts contradicted the video evidence.

“Any conversation between you and your partner?” the head of the investigative unit asked Officer Herbert Davis hours after the shooting.

“No,” Davis answered.

That wasn’t true.

After arriving at Trawick’s apartment and finding him holding a stick and a bread knife, body-worn camera footage shows that Davis, who is Black, told his less-experienced white partner, Officer Brendan Thompson, not to use his Taser. “Don’t, don’t, don’t,” he said, motioning for Thompson to step back.

Thompson fired his Taser anyway, causing Trawick to become enraged, and Davis then tried to stop Thompson from shooting Trawick. “No, no, don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t,” Davis said, before briefly pushing Thompson’s gun down.

The investigators had access to all that footage. They never asked either officer about it.

ProPublica obtained the NYPD’s full internal investigation, including audio of interviews with both officers, via a Freedom of Information Law request.

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