Tag: police state

2 ex-NYPD cops sentenced for sexually assaulting passed-out woman, as survivor details trauma: ‘I feel nothing but anger and rage’

Two former NYPD cops were sentenced to probation for sexually assaulting an incapacitated woman after a night out at a Bronx bar — as the survivor of the heinous crime urged others to report their stories, no matter the title of their assailant.

Julio Alcantara-Santiago, 40, and Christian Garcia, 32, were sentenced on Friday at Bronx Supreme Criminal Court after taking a plea agreement for the assault that unfolded on July 9, 2023.

Alcantara-Santiago appeared nervous in an orange blazer and pinstriped pants as he was sentenced to six years of sex offender probation.

Garcia sported a two-piece navy suit and glasses as he accepted one year of probation and was ordered to complete a behavioral treatment program.

On the night of June 8, 2023, the unidentified woman went out with co-workers at Zona De Cuba lounge in Grand Concourse, according to a victim impact statement she read aloud to the courtroom.

After going up to a rooftop area of the establishment and having some drinks, the next thing she recalled was waking up to being sexually assaulted by two men in a stranger’s home.

“The next thing I remember is slightly waking up in someone’s home. And then what hurts more is that I see two men over me and feel hands in certain parts of my body,” she said.

“I start to make movement so that the men can stop. I’m terrified and scared that if I say something or if they notice that I’m awake while they’re doing certain things, they will harm me or even kill me,” she told the courtroom.

She said she continued to lie there and fell asleep, and woke up the next morning, realizing she was still in the strange apartment near the lounge.

After desperately calling her sister and best friend for help, she escaped the home and decided to go to a local Bronx hospital to be evaluated. There, she was given a rape kit and spoke to multiple police officers, the victim said.

The two officers were arrested in April 2024 after surveillance footage helped connect them to the crime. Both cops were suspended without pay, the NYPD said at the time.

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Cloudflare Vs Italy: The Battle For Digital Freedom And Global Internet Sovereignty

Italian authorities are attempting to force the internet service provider Cloudflare to delete and block certain online services. Cloudflare is resisting and has turned to the U.S. government for support.

The fight for a free internet is intensifying.

The struggle over control of information, censorship, and economic dominance in the digital space is increasingly becoming a fundamental civilizational question. That the European Union now sees not only the EU Commission but also national governments and security apparatuses siding with information diktats, against the fundamental principle of free speech, sends a dangerous signal to the world. The EU has effectively withdrawn from the circle of freedom-oriented state actors.

Into this picture fits a recent report from Italy. A tweet by the founder and CEO of the internet infrastructure provider Cloudflare, Matthew Prince, has caused a stir.

Prince reports that Cloudflare has been hit with a $17 million fine by a — as he calls it — clandestine cabal in Italy. The accusation: Cloudflare refused to participate in an Italian censorship mechanism at the behest of this group.

A Cabal of Regulators and Media Corporations

Specifically, this concerns a system controlled by the Italian media authority AGCOM (Autorità per le Garanzie nelle Comunicazioni) called the “Piracy Shield.” This blocking system is officially aimed at combating illegal sports and media streaming services. The main targets are the economic interests of major players such as Italy’s Serie A football league, Sky Italia, DAZN, Mediaset, and other large European media and rights corporations.

Private actors, comparable to the so-called “Trusted Flaggers” now familiar in Germany, operate on behalf of the Italian media sector within this system. They report websites, IP addresses, or suspicious domains to the Piracy Shield. The authority then compels internet service providers and infrastructure operators like Cloudflare to implement the corresponding blocks within just 30 minutes. Every advertising minute counts; piracy is indeed a dangerously significant economic factor. The question is: How do states and affected companies enforce copyright? Do they operate under the rule of law and avoid collateral damage, such as backdoor state censorship?

According to Prince, all of this happens without a judicial order or prior review, bypassing due legal process entirely. The measures affect not only allegedly illegal content but also deeply intrude into the technical infrastructure of the internet.

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Jack Smith Deposition Shows His Get-Trump Lawfare Was Also A War On Free Speech

In the last few months, we have gained valuable insights into former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s unprecedented effort to criminally prosecute President Donald Trump, at the time a former president and leading contender for the presidency.

In Injustice, Washington Post reporters Carol Leonnig and Aaron Davis, appearing to rely heavily on accounts from Smith’s top deputies, paint a picture of a prosecutor doggedly focused on one objective: prosecuting Trump. On New Year’s Eve, however, the House Judiciary Committee released the transcript of Smith’s closed-door deposition. While a prosecutor’s crusade to imprison a presidential candidate is troubling in itself, Smith’s deposition testimony was alarming, as it betrayed Smith’s utter disdain for the fundamental right to freedom of speech enshrined in the First Amendment. 

Smith’s so-called “election interference” case in Washington, D.C., has long raised a fundamental question: What was the crime? In his deposition, Smith claimed Trump’s statements that the 2020 election was “rife with fraud” were “absolutely not” protected by the First Amendment and, indeed, formed the basis for his prosecution. Smith went on to claim that Trump would reject information that Smith believed he should have credited and reached out to individuals whom Smith deemed uncredible. 

Whether you are the president of the United States or an anonymous poster on X, the First Amendment protects your right to speak about elections. The First Amendment’s guarantee of free speech is a critical check on the power of the government, as it prevents the government from punishing those who speak out against it. Punishing speech regarding an election is especially insidious: American history is replete with instances in which litigation has changed the results of elections, and election fraud has been proven.

For example, in Hawaii, a court-ordered recount changed the outcome of the presidential contest in that state. And it was only because President John F. Kennedy sent a slate of alternate electors to Washington that Kennedy’s victory in Hawaii was counted. Criminalizing the questioning of elections is an invitation for election fraud and, regardless, tramples on the right we all enjoy to criticize our government. 

Smith’s disdain for the First Amendment did not end with his attempt to prosecute Trump for speaking about the 2020 election. Speaking about the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol, Smith stated unequivocally that Trump “caused it.” The Department of Justice (before and after Smith’s appointment as special counsel) and the Jan. 6 Committee each spent years (and millions of dollars of taxpayer money) investigating the Capitol demonstration, and neither uncovered a shred of evidence that Trump had any role in planning the riot. Indeed, Smith never sought an indictment against Trump for inciting a riot, which would have been the obvious charge if Smith had uncovered such evidence. Yet Smith tried to justify his extraordinary claim that Trump caused the riot by saying Trump’s statements about the 2020 election “created a certain level of distrust.”

If an American — president or otherwise — could be criminally responsible for what others do in response to political speech, the possibilities for prosecution would be limitless. In the lead-up to the 2024 election, Trump survived two assassination attempts. The would-be assassins were surely radicalized by someone, likely media figures or other politicians who spent years falsely deriding Trump as a dictator or puppet of Vladimir Putin.

Politicians’ reckless rhetoric in the wake of George Floyd’s death led to massive riots in multiple American cities, causing the destruction of many small businesses. But the notion of a special counsel seeking an indictment of an MSNBC personality for the Trump assassination attempts or a Democrat member of Congress for the Black Lives Matter riots is downright farcical (as it should be).

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UK Government Video Game Teaches Teens Questioning Mass Immigration Could Make Them Terror Suspects

Britain’s globalist—and increasingly authoritarian—state has found a new way to ‘fight extremism’: teach teenagers that asking the ‘wrong questions’ about mass immigration could make them terrorists.

According to newly surfaced materials, a government-funded video game now warns schoolchildren that doubting the positive effects of unrelenting  mass migration will land them in the crosshairs of counter-terrorism authorities.

The program, called Pathways, is marketed as an “educational” interactive experience for students aged 11 to 18. In practice, however, it functions as a digital loyalty test, funded in part by the Home Office’s Prevent program, Britain’s controversial anti-extremism scheme.

The game goes something like this. Players are placed in the role of a white teenage character named Charlie, newly enrolled in college and navigating modern Britain’s ideological minefield. Every decision—what videos to watch, what opinions to express, even whether to research immigration statistics—is tracked by an in-game extremism meter.

The premise is simple and utterly unmistakable: curiosity is dangerous, skepticism is suspect, and deviation from approved liberal-globalist, views carries severe consequences. Choose the wrong dialogue option, and Charlie is flagged for “extreme right-wing ideology,” a category that now appears to include asking basic questions about national identity.

Even the character’s gender is carefully flattened. Regardless of whether players select a male or female avatar, Charlie is referred to exclusively as “they,” a telling detail in a game obsessed with left-liberal ideological conformity.

Early scenarios in the game set the tone. Charlie struggles academically and is outperformed by an Afro-British classmate, after which players are nudged toward ‘correct’ emotional responses while being warned against drawing conclusions about immigration or competition.

At several points, the game introduces online posts claiming the government prioritizes migrants over British veterans for housing. Players are encouraged to scroll past these claims silently. Engaging, questioning, or researching them triggers ominous warnings.

Attempting to “learn more” is portrayed as especially risky. The game depicts Charlie being overwhelmed by statistics, reports, and protest information. Instead of being framed as civic engagement, the game clearly suggests it’s a slippery slope into ideological contamination.

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Why Insulting Brigitte Macron Online Can Mean Prison Time in France

In the United States, poking fun at politicians online is a birthright. In France, it could land you in jail.

On Monday, a French court found 10 people guilty of cyberbullying France’s first lady, Brigitte Macron. The defendants’ “crime” was falsely claiming on X that the first lady was born male and characterizing her relationship with French President Emmanuel Macron as pedophilic. (The French president met his wife when he was about 16 years old and she was a 39-year-old drama teacher at his high school.)

Defendants denied the charges against them by “saying their posts were either meant in jest or constituted legitimate debate,” reports The New York Times. Unfortunately for them, this argument rang hollow for the court, which handed out a variety of punishments. These included compulsory cyberbullying awareness training, eight suspended prison sentences, one six-month sentence to be served from home, and a six-month social media ban for five of the defendants. The defendants were also fined 600 euros (roughly $700) each and were ordered “to contribute to a total of 10,000 euros—about $12,000—in compensation” to the first lady, reports the Times.

While the thought of someone facing fines and jail time for a social media post may seem strange to Americans (although it does sometimes happen), French constitutional law is much more permissive of speech restrictions than its American counterpart.

The French Constitution holds that “any citizen may therefore speak, write and publish freely.” However, unlike the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, it immediately caveats this right by excluding “what is tantamount to the abuse of this liberty in the cases determined by Law.”

This carveout has allowed the French government to outlaw speech acts like bullying, which it defines as “the act of bullying a person through repeated comments or behavior whose purpose or effect is to degrade their quality of life, leading to an alteration in their physical or mental well-being.” Cyberbullying is defined as bullying through an electronic medium. Both are punishable by up to two years’ imprisonment and a fine of 30,000 euros (nearly $35,000).

Based on the punishment they could have received, the defendants in the Macron case got off practically scot-free. But that doesn’t mean that we should praise the French court for its graciousness. Comparing French and American law reveals just how unlucky the French are when it comes to their free speech rights.

Ari Cohn, a lawyer with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, tells Reason that, while there are laws in the U.S. against cyber harassment, they have been interpreted narrowly by courts to comply with the First Amendment.

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Starmer’s Looking for an Excuse to Ban X

Keir Starmer has signaled he is prepared to back regulatory action that could ultimately result in X being blocked in the UK.

The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom has suggested, more or less, that because Elon Musk’s AI chatbot Grok has been generating images of women and minors in bikinis, he’ll support going as far as hitting the kill switch and blocking access to the entire platform.

“The situation is disgraceful and disgusting,” Starmer said on Greatest Hits Radio; the station best known for playing ABBA and now, apparently, for frontline authoritarian tech policy announcements.

“X has got to get a grip of this, and Ofcom has our full support to take action…I’ve asked for all options to be on the table.”

“All options,” for those who don’t speak fluent Whitehall euphemism, now apparently includes turning Britain’s digital infrastructure into a sort of beige North Korea, where a bunch of government bureaucrats, armed with nothing but Online Safety Act censorship law and the panic of a 90s tabloid, get to decide which speech the public is allowed to see.

Now, you might be wondering: Surely he’s bluffing? Oh no. According to Downing Street sources, they’re quite serious.

And they’ve even named the mechanism: the Online Safety Act; that cheery little piece of legislation that sounds like it’s going to help grandmothers avoid email scams, but actually gives Ofcom the power to block platforms, fine them into oblivion, or ban them entirely if they don’t comply with government censorship orders.

Killing X isn’t a new idea. You may remember Morgan McSweeney, Keir Starmer’s Chief of Staff, founded the Centre for Countering Digital Hate. In 2024, leaks revealed that the group was trying to “Kill Musk’s Twitter.”

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Trump Says He Expects To ‘Run’ Venezuela for Years

President Trump has told The New York Times that he expects to “run” Venezuela for many years following the US attack on Caracas to abduct President Nicolas Maduro.

By “running” Venezuela, the president appears to mean controlling its oil industry and getting access to the country’s vast oil reserves, the largest in the world, for more American companies.

“We will rebuild it in a very profitable way,” he told the paper. “We’re going to be using oil, and we’re going to be taking oil. We’re getting oil prices down, and we’re going to be giving money to Venezuela, which they desperately need.”

When asked how long he expects the US to remain Venezuela’s “political overlord,” three months, six months, or a year, the president said, “I would say much longer.”

Trump has threatened to attack Venezuela again and potentially send troops, but declined to say what sort of situation could lead to that. “I wouldn’t want to tell you that,” he said.

Trump and his top officials have said that the US will be controlling Venezuela’s oil sales and will start by acquiring 30 million to 50 million barrels. However, Venezuela’s state oil company, PDVSA, has framed the deal as a routine sale of oil to the US, similar to its dealings with Chevron, which continues to operate in the country.

Trump insisted to the Times that Venezuela’s government, which is currently led by Acting President Delcy Rodriguez, Maduro’s vice president, is “giving us everything that we feel is necessary.”

Rodriguez has said that no “foreign agent” is running Venezuela and has maintained that Maduro is the rightful president and must be released by the US. “Today, more than ever, the Bolivarian political forces stand firm and united to guarantee the stability of our nation,” she said in a post on Telegram on Thursday.

“Together with the Great Patriotic Pole Simón Bolívar (GPPSB), we have reviewed and cohesively adopted three lines of action: the release of our heroes, President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores; preserving peace and stability throughout the national territory; and consolidating governance for the benefit of our people,” she added.

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The First Amendment Allows You to Report Things the Government Doesn’t Want Reported

The House Oversight Committee has subpoenaed journalist Seth Harp (Washington Post, 1/8/26) over his posting on X a photo and publicly available biographical information about the US colonel who apparently leads the Army’s Delta Force unit, which played a key role in the abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

Committee member Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R–Fla.) called for Harp’s criminal prosecution, accusing him of “leaking classified information” and “doxing” the colonel. In a statement to the Washington Post, she said:

The First Amendment does not give anyone a license to expose elite military personnel, compromise operations or assist our adversaries under the guise of reporting.

Actually, the First Amendment does give you a license to do all of those things. None of them are covered by the extremely limited exceptions to the freedom of the press recognized by the US Constitution.

And allowing these is not the unfortunate consequence of unbridled free expression; these are liberties that are core to maintaining a semblance of democracy. Do you want to be ruled by secret military commanders? Do you want it to be illegal to report on your country’s use of military force? Do you want to live in a country where journalists are in prison for “assisting our adversaries”?

Unfortunately, though, the House Oversight Committee apparently does want all of those things.

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UK Orders Ofcom to Explore Encryption Backdoors

By now, we’ve all heard the familiar refrain: “It’s for your safety.” It’s the soothing mantra of every government official who’s ever wanted a peek behind your digital curtains.

This week, with a move that would make East Germany blush, the UK government officially confirmed its intention to hand Ofcom  (yes, that Ofcom, the regulator that once investigated whether Love Island was too spicy) the keys to your private messages.

The country, already experiencing rapidly declining civil liberties, is now planning to scan encrypted chats for “bad stuff.”

Now, for those unfamiliar, Ofcom is the UK’s communications regulator that has recently been given censorship pressure powers for online speech.

It’s become the government’s Swiss Army knife for everything from internet censorship to now, apparently, full-blown surveillance.

Under the Online Safety Act, Ofcom has been handed something called Section 121, which sounds like a tax loophole but is actually a legal crowbar for prying open encrypted messages.

It allows the regulator to compel any online service that lets people talk to each other, Facebook Messenger, Signal, iMessage, etc to install “accredited technology” to scan for terrorism or child abuse material.

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No Surprise: Burma Army Leads Stilted Elections

The first round of Burma (Myanmar)’s three-phase elections began on December 28, 2025, under a framework imposed by the military junta that seized power in January 2021. With major opposition parties barred, voting canceled in 65 of the country’s 330 townships due to ongoing fighting, and further cancellations expected, the military-aligned Union Solidarity and Development Party is leading, an outcome critics say was predetermined.

The results defy logic. If the people wanted to be ruled by generals, they would not have been fighting the military for the past eight decades in what is widely recognized as the world’s longest-running conflict.

Opposition groups argue the vote is neither free nor fair and serves to legitimize continued military rule through tightly controlled elections that exclude major parties and suppress dissent, prompting several groups to call for a boycott.

The military government said more than six million people voted in the Dec. 28 first phase, claiming a turnout of about 52 percent of eligible voters in participating areas and calling it a success. The Union Election Commission said the USDP won 38 seats in the 330-seat lower house, with results still pending.

Party leader Khin Yi, a former general and police chief closely aligned with junta leader Min Aung Hlaing, was declared the winner in his Naypyitaw constituency. Naypyitaw is the military-built administrative capital established after the coup.

According to a senior USDP official speaking anonymously, the party has secured 88 of the 102 seats contested in the first phase, including 29 constituencies where it ran unopposed. The Shan Nationalities Democratic Party and the Mon Unity Party each won one seat. The official also claimed the USDP captured about 85 percent of contested regional legislature seats, though full results will only be known after later phases.

Myanmar’s parliament consists of two houses with 664 total seats, and the party controlling a combined majority can select the president and form a government. Under the constitution, the military is guaranteed 25 percent of seats in each chamber, giving it decisive built-in power regardless of election outcomes. Only six parties are competing nationwide with any realistic chance of parliamentary influence, with the USDP far ahead of its rivals.

Voting is being held in three phases because of ongoing fighting across the country. The first round covered 102 townships, with additional voting scheduled for Jan. 11 and Jan. 25, while 65 townships are excluded entirely due to conflict. Although thousands of candidates from dozens of parties are nominally contesting seats, political competition remains tightly restricted.

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