Police assisted by the Federation Against Copyright Theft showed up in large numbers to arrest an alleged movie pirate in the UK this week. Armed with an emergency search warrant issued out of hours by a judge, five undercover police vehicles containing detectives and FACT officers were deployed to arrest a 24-year-old said to have recorded the movie Fast and Furious 6.

The MPAA-backed Federation Against Copyright Theft is well known for its anti-piracy actions around the UK, tracking down alleged movie pirates with the help of the police and hauling them, if at all possible, through the court system.

What remains remarkable about FACT operations is how they are able to persuade the police to invest significant resources towards detaining individuals for non-violent crimes.

A truck hauling an oversized load of drilling equipment hit an overhead bridge girder on the major route between Seattle and Canada, sending a section of the interstate into the river below as the driver watched the structure collapse in his rearview mirror.

Thursday afternoon, Sens. Carl Levin, D-Mich., and John McCain, R-Ariz., the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Government Affairs investigations subcommittee, called on Daniel Werfel, the new acting IRS commissioner, "to suspend immediately Lois Lerner from her office as Director of the Office of Exempt Organizations."
In a letter to Werfel, Levin and McCain accused Lerner of not being forthcoming about the targeting scandal during an hours-long interview by the subcommittee,
writing that she "failed to disclose the internal controversy over the search terms used by the Cincinnati office to identify 501(c)(4) groups for further review, the actions taken by that office in reviewing the identified groups, the investigation and imminent findings by the Treasury Department Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA); and TIGTA's conclusion that the IRS had used inappropriate criteria to target Tea Party and other conservative groups.
Ms. Lerner also failed to disclose that she was fully aware of these issues as early as June 2011, and, according to TIGTA, had been personally involved in reviewing questionable actions taken by the Cincinnati office."

"Given the serious failure by Ms. Lerner to disclose to this Subcommittee key information on topics that the Subcommittee was investigating, we have lost confidence in her ability to fulfill her duties," they continued.

Mark Ciavarella Jr, a 61-year old former judge in Pennsylvania, has been sentenced to nearly 30 years in prison for literally selling young juveniles for cash. He was convicted of accepting money in exchange for incarcerating thousands of adults and children into a prison facility owned by a developer who was paying him under the table. The kickbacks amounted to more than $1 million.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has overturned some 4,000 convictions issued by him between 2003 and 2008, claiming he violated the constitutional rights of the juveniles – including the right to legal counsel and the right to intelligently enter a plea. Some of the juveniles he sentenced were as young as 10-years old.

Ciavarella was convicted of 12 counts, including racketeering, money laundering, mail fraud and tax evasion. He was also ordered to repay $1.2 million in restitution.

His "kids for cash" program has revealed that corruption is indeed within the prison system, mostly driven by the growth in private prisons seeking profits by any means necessary.
http://blog.blacknews.com/2013/05/judge-mark-ciavarella-sentenced-selling-kids-prison-system101.html?m=1#.UZ4YHWR4aHc

Wealthy developer Robert K. Mericle agreed Friday to pay $17.75 million to settle civil-rights actions filed against him and his companies by former juvenile offenders who claim they were unjustly imprisoned in the kids-for-cash scandal.

The claims stem from Mericle's payment of $2.1 million to two former Luzerne County judges who placed juveniles in two for-profit detention centers built by one of his companies. The settlement does not affect ongoing claims against the judges, who are serving lengthy prison terms, the owners of the centers and other defendants.

Robert Mericle's sentencing in connection with his pleading guilty to failing to report a felony has been delayed pending his testimony in the bribery trial of former Pennsylvania State Senator Raphael Musto, which is scheduled for June.
Mericle faces up to three years in prison, although he is likely to receive 12 to 18 months under United States Federal Sentencing Guidelines

]Robert Powell pleaded guilty in 2009 to concealing a felony and an accessory charge in the so-called "kids for cash" scandal.

"We see a society that is becoming increasingly divided and where the gaps, both socially and economically, are becoming larger," said Rami Al-khamisi, co-founder of Megafonen, a group that works for social change in the suburbs. "And the people out here are being hit the hardest … We have institutional racism."

"The reason is very simple. Unemployment, the housing situation, disrespect from police," said Rouzbeh Djalaie, editor of Norra Sidan newspaper. "It just takes something to start a riot, and that was the shooting."

Djalaie said youths were often stopped by police in the streets for identity checks. During the riots, he said some police called local youths "apes".

The City of Miami has taken to federal court to undo a 15-year-old legal agreement that protected homeless people from undue arrest and harassment by the authorities.
The city is concerned the homeless population is stunting downtown's growth,
and want the courts to alter a 1988 settlement that bars Miami police from arresting homeless people for such "involuntary, harmless acts'' without first offering them an alternative location to lay their head.

Police argue that the homeless are scaring not only families, but workers.
Fans pouring into the American Airlines Arena for Heat games, meanwhile,
are being met with more aggressive panhandlers blocking sidewalks and relieving themselves in public.

....the city acceded to the so-called Pottinger Settlement back in 1988
because the ACLU made a compelling case that police were abusing the city's most vulnerable citizens.
Back then, police routinely rounded up homeless, dumped their belongings in the trash and charged them with loitering.

What's more, advocates say that settlement has decreased the homeless population from 6,000 to just 351 -- with many of those 351 only still on the streets because they refuse assistance.
The act makes it illegal to arrest any homeless person, unless they refuse shelter and board.