Author: Joe from MassPrivateI

Reason – by Jacob Sullem

While serving in the U.S. Navy more than three decades ago, Chad Linton pleaded guilty to driving under the influence, a misdemeanor, and attempting to evade a police vehicle, a Class C felony, in Island County, Washington. More than four decades ago, when he was 18, Paul Stewart was found guilty of first-degree burglary, a felony, after hopping a fence and stealing tools from an unlocked telephone company truck in Yuma County, Arizona. In both cases, the felony convictions were eventually vacated, and both men’s firearm rights were restored.   Continue reading “California Says Residents With Vacated Out-of-State Convictions May Not Own Guns”

MassPrivateI

A few months ago I called 2018 the “Rise of Spying Transit Police” but after looking through my archives, I noticed a more disturbing pattern emerge. Time and again, month after month, most of the stories I wrote revolved around one thing, watchlists.

In January, I wrote two stories about facial recognition and police camshares that centered around corporate and law enforcement watchlists. From then on things got progressively worse, watchlists blacklists and whitelists are expanding at a frightening pace.   Continue reading “2018: The year public watchlists became commonplace”

AP

HOTAN, China (AP) — Barbed wire and hundreds of cameras ring a massive compound of more than 30 dormitories, schools, warehouses and workshops in China’s far west. Dozens of armed officers and a growling Doberman stand guard outside.

Behind locked gates, men and women are sewing sportswear that can end up on U.S. college campuses and sports teams.   Continue reading “US sportswear traced to factory in China’s internment camps”

The Guardian

An Amazon customer got a grim message last year from Alexa, the virtual assistant in the company’s smart speaker device: “Kill your foster parents.”

The user who heard the message from his Echo device wrote a harsh review on Amazon’s website, Reuters reported – calling Alexa’s utterance “a whole new level of creepy”.   Continue reading “Alexa’s advice to ‘kill your foster parents’ fuels concern over Amazon Echo”

Governing – by Candice Norwood

When the International Olympic Committee announced that Atlanta would host the 1996 Summer Olympics, security for such a massive event was an immediate concern.

As part of their preparation, local police traveled to Israel to learn about its security and counterterrorism strategies. In May alone, Israel saw a total of 684 “terrorist events,” according to an Israeli government website. By contrast, since 1980, there have been 11 notable terrorist attacks with fatalities on American soil. Continue reading “U.S. Police Under Pressure to End Their Relationship With Israel”

ACLU – by Brian Hauss

Should it be a crime to call public officials corrupt? Yes, according to the police in Exeter, New Hampshire. Earlier this year, they arrested a local man for writing a comment on a news website accusing Police Chief William Shupe of covering for a corrupt officer.

Robert Frese was accused of violating New Hampshire’s criminal defamation law, which makes it a misdemeanor to intentionally and falsely disparage another person. New Hampshire’s law — and others like it in 24 other states around the country — literally make it a crime to say mean things about people.   Continue reading “New Hampshire Police Arrested a Man for Being Mean to Them on the Internet”

Starkville Daily News

Continue reading “Webster Co. sheriff arrested on multiple felony charges”

Reason – by Zuri Davis

Over 500 guns were surrendered to Baltimore police within the first hour and a half of a citywide gun buyback program this week. Participants received anywhere from $25 to $500 for their unwanted firearms.

Mayor Catherine Pugh and Interim Police Commissioner Gary Tuggle announced a gun buyback program—the first in six years—last week. Pugh said that the program was intended to “get the guns off of our streets.”   Continue reading “Baltimore Woman Says She’ll Use Gun Buyback Cash to Pay for an Even Bigger Gun”

Governing – by Candice Norwood

In his final hours as U.S. Attorney General last month, Jeff Sessions issued a memo limiting the Justice Department’s power to pursue and enforce federal consent decrees with local police departments.

These court-enforced arrangements were a major tool for the Obama administration to curb patterns of police abuse and misconduct during a time of heightened national attention on the issue. The Obama administration launched “pattern or practice” investigations into 25 police departments and entered into 14 consent decrees. By comparison, the Trump administration has initiated zero.   Continue reading “Are Cops ‘Off the Hook’? How Police Reform Has Changed Under Trump”

The Guardian – by Ed Pilkington

An international body entrusted with upholding human rights across the Americas has called for an immediate ban on the controversial use of electric shocks on severely disabled children in a school outside Boston.

The Judge Rotenberg Center in Canton, Massachusetts, is believed to be the only school in the world that routinely inflicts high-powered electric shocks as a form of punishment on vulnerable children and adults. About 47 of its students are currently subjected to the “treatment”, which involves individuals being zapped with electric currents far more powerful than those discharged by stun guns.   Continue reading “Human rights body calls on US school to ban electric shocks on children”

Courthouse News – by Nick Rummell

ALBANY, N.Y. (CN) – In another blow to gun rights groups in New York state, a federal judge on Monday dismissed a lawsuit from two gun owners seeking to overturn the state’s tight restrictions on concealed-carry licenses.

The Empire State prohibits most gun owners from carrying pistols and rifles outside their home, except for hunting purposes, unless they can show a special need for self-defense.   Continue reading “New Yorkers Lose Bid to Carry Guns in Public”

Daily Journal

UPPER MARLBORO, Md. — Eleven police officers in a suburb of Washington, D.C., have been suspended after two off-duty officers were wounded in what police believe to be an accidental shooting at a holiday party.

The Prince George’s County Police Department said in a statement Monday that both officers were treated at hospitals and released early Sunday.   Continue reading “Police: 2 officers wounded in accidental shooting at party”

Reason – by Jacob Sullum

On Friday the Florida Supreme Court confirmed that police officers as well as other citizens are immune from prosecution under state law when they legally use deadly force in self-defense. Under Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” self-defense law, that means they are entitled to a pretrial hearing testing their self-defense claim before prosecutors can go to trial.   Continue reading “Did the Florida Supreme Court Just Give Cops More Leeway to Kill With Impunity?”

LMT Online – by Peter Hermann, The Washington Post

WASHINGTON – The D.C. Council on Tuesday could pass new laws restricting the ability of gun owners to modify weapons and require police to seize guns while enforcing protective orders in domestic disputes.

The latter provision – known as a “red flag law” – is gaining popularity, with variants implemented in more than a dozen states, including Maryland. The D.C. version would mandate that authorities take firearms out of the hands of suspected abusers more quickly than is permitted under existing laws. Other proposed laws, if passed, would the ban rapid-fire attachments known as bump stocks and increase penalties for extended magazines, accessories that allow guns to fire faster and hold more bullets.   Continue reading “D.C. proposal would let police take guns from people accused of domestic abuse”

Ammo.com

Picture this: You’re driving home from the casino and you’ve absolutely cleaned up – to the tune of $50,000. You see a police car pull up behind you, but you can’t figure out why. Not only have you not broken any laws, you’re not even speeding. But the police officer doesn’t appear to be interested in charging you with a crime. Instead, he takes your gambling winnings, warns you not to say anything to anyone unless you want to be charged as a drug kingpin, then drives off into the sunset.  Continue reading “Policing For Profit: How Civil Asset Forfeiture Has Perverted American Law Enforcement”