Monday, April 8th, 2013 — Good Afternoon, Stay Safe
- - - - -
‘One Police Plaza’
An Inspector General: The Past’s Not Necessarily Prelude
By: Leonard Levitt – Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘NYPD Confidential.Com’
(Op-Ed / Commentary)
Is the idea of an Inspector General to monitor the NYPD as far-fetched and unworkable as Police Commissioner Ray Kelly and his claque of supporters claim?
Well, the NYPD had a monitor 20 years ago, although under a different guise. He was a civilian Deputy Commissioner in charge of the department’s Internal Affairs Bureau.
Kelly, under duress in his first term as police commissioner, appointed him.
The monitor was Walter Mack, a former federal prosecutor under Rudy Giuliani with impeccable credentials, whom Giuliani forced out after Mack had suggested that Giuliani was taking credit for investigations begun by his predecessor.
As an NYPD Deputy Commissioner, Mack established a model for IAB that was praised by city prosecutors, federal law enforcement officials and the Mollen Commission on police corruption, whose formation had led Kelly to appoint him.
In an interview last week, Mack said he viewed his position not as an outside monitor but as an outsider who was an inside monitor. He reported directly to Kelly. “He did not in any way limit my authority,” Mack said.
The key to Mack’s success, he said, was recognizing that a monitor could not sit above and apart from the police department but had to engage the department: in his case, IAB. “No one is better able than IAB to run undercover investigations dealing with police corruption,” he said.
Mack didn’t last, though. A marine captain and Vietnam War veteran who later protested the war, Mack was a graduate of the elite Milton Academy, Harvard College and Columbia Law School. He was, in his own words, “an alien” to the NYPD.
After appointing Mack. Kelly didn’t last either. Giuliani dismissed him after he was inaugurated as mayor in 1994. A year later, Kelly’s successor, Bill Bratton, purged Mack.
Of course, there are differences between Mack’s appointment 20 years ago and a proposed Inspector General as envisioned today. Most important is the scope of the Inspector General’s mandate.
Mack had been appointed a Deputy Commissioner under Kelly solely to supervise the NYPD’s Internal Affairs Bureau, then under scrutiny for failing to root out police corruption.
The mandate for the proposed Inspector General, while yet undefined, appears to be far wider in authority than Mack’s. The talk is also that the Inspector General will be separate and apart from the Police Commissioner —maybe even over him.
But there are also similarities. Most important, there is a constant: Ray Kelly.
So what can we learn from the past? Let’s set the scene.
Back then, a crew of Brooklyn cops, headed by Michael Dowd, was running wild and dealing drugs out of their Brooklyn precincts. The police department’s corruption watchdog, its Internal Affairs Division before it became a bureau, did nothing to stop them.
Dowd’s drug dealing was discovered, not by the NYPD, but by police in Suffolk County, L.I. The result was a public outcry. The result of that: the formation by Mayor David Dinkins of the Mollen Commission, headed by Judge Milton Mollen. By the time the commission wrapped up, it had gone far beyond Dowd, resulting in convictions of three dozen cops in the 30th precinct on drug-related charges.
Kelly, who became police commissioner a few months after Dinkins announced the Mollen Commission, was as resistant to challenges to his authority as he is today.
He was also as mindful of his reputation.
Initially, he resisted changes to IAB. When its head, Chief Daniel Sullivan, retired, Kelly promoted its number two man, Robert Beatty, who was said to be Kelly’s friend and whose brief tenure was marred by botched cases and apparent cover-ups.
In the fall of 1993, the Mollen Commission held public hearings, where Beatty’s failings were exposed. Sullivan testified that Beatty had failed to inform prosecutors of 250 cases of serious corruption, and that 40 serious corruption cases in the past five years had not been entered in IAB’s files. Instead, said Sullivan, cases involving high-ranking officers were hidden in what was known as a “tickler file.”
As a result, the Mollen Commission proposed an outside monitor. Only then did Kelly act.
Before the commission issued its final report, Kelly ran from the rear of the anti-corruption line to lead the reform parade, taking the unprecedented step of hiring a civilian — Mack — to oversee Internal Affairs.
Kelly then attempted to cleanse his own reputation, down to the smallest detail. “Kelly phoned me last Friday to protest that I had maligned him in my column on police corruption,” wrote Sydney Schanberg, then a columnist for New York Newsday, in 1993. “He insisted he was not a ‘close friend’ of Beatty as I had written, and knew him ‘only in a professional way.’”
Today, the situation is different, starting with Kelly. He is a different person from who he was 20 years ago. He has served longer than any police commissioner in city history. Mayor Michael Bloomberg has allowed him more power. As a result, Kelly accepts no criticism. He accepts no authority but his own.
Asked by the Wall Street Journal last week what he has changed regarding the NYPD’s pervasive surveillance of Muslims in light of the Associated Press’s Pulitzer-prize winning series concluding that Muslim were unfairly targeted, Kelly answered: “Nothing.”
Another difference is that today’s proposed Inspector General did not result from old-fashioned police corruption but from numerous other issues, the most prominent of which is the department’s aggressive Stop and Frisk policy. Since Kelly’s return as commissioner in 2002, this has resulted in some five million stops, primarily of blacks between the ages of 14 to 21, the legality of which is currently playing out in federal court.
After ten years of pandering news reports about Kelly, a new media dynamic has emerged.
At the Stop and Frisk trial last week, Brooklyn State Senator Eric Adams, a former police captain and longtime Kelly antagonist, charged that Kelly had told him in the presence of former Gov. David Paterson and former Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries that police stopped black youths solely “to install fear of the police.”
Adams had made that charge previously, most recently on NY1 two years ago. But nobody was listening. Only NYPD Confidential reported it.
Last week, all the city’s daily newspapers reported Adams’s accusation — but both Paterson and Jeffries, now a U.S. Congressman, pulled disappearing acts when asked to confirm it.
Kelly, who is not testifying at the trial for reasons that city lawyers refused to discuss, issued a categorical denial, although, as Judge Shira Scheindlin pointed out, his denial would not be included in the court record unless Kelly testified in the trial.
Instead, Kelly defended Stop and Frisk before The Rev. Al Sharpton and his National Action League.
The week before, Sharpton had called for the suspension of an NYPD deputy inspector who, in a secret recording played at the Stop and Frisk trial, had ordered his officers to stop and frisk “the right people at the right time at the right location.” Unofficial translation: stop all black males ages 14 to 21.
So is an outside monitor necessary for the NYPD? Equally important, can it work?
For the record, here’s what the Mollen Commission said in its final report in 1994:
“If history proves anything, it is that when the glare of scrutiny shines on the Department, it can and will successfully police itself. History also proves that, left to its own devices, the Department will backslide and its commitment to integrity will erode. It is no coincidence that the only two times in the past 20 years that fighting corruption has been a priority in the Department was when an independent commission publicly reviewed and disclosed the Department’s failure to keep its own house in order.”
The Commission then made two recommendations before passing into history. The first was the establishment of a permanent corruption monitor outside the police department. The second was that the monitor must have subpoena power to investigate police corruption on its own. Mayor Giuliani, reversing his position as a federal prosecutor, rejected both.
- -
A KELLY RANT. Meanwhile, a defensive, though combative, Kelly sat for an interview with the Wall Street Journal last week and blamed the idea of an Inspector General on politics and a biased judge.
“The police department has sort of become a piñata in this mayoral race. Their [Democratic mayoral candidates’] goal is to see who can get as far to the left as possible because they see that as the key to winning the primary,” he told James Freeman, an assistant editor of the Journal’s editorial page, which headlined the piece, “The Political War on the NYPD.”
“They are hell-bent on finding anything they can wrong with the department,” Kelly said.
“It’s just a small group and they have intimidated these politicians to take this route. And, also in my view, the judge is very much in their corner and has been all along throughout her career.”
Kelly also called an outside monitor “one of the biggest scams in law enforcement…. Nothing is ever right. Because if I think everything’s right, then I stop getting paid.”
A simpatico Freeman asked whether Kelly should run for mayor to “take on his critics.” Kelly considered running in 2008 before Bloomberg pulled the rug out from under him by deciding to run for a third term. So far, he has rejected running in this election cycle.
A couple of factors may alter that.
First, becoming mayor may be the surest way to short-circuit an outside monitor.
Second, the leading mayoral candidate, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, may have shot herself in the foot by supporting an outside police monitor while saying, oxymoronically, she wanted to keep Kelly as commissioner.
What if Bloomberg, who opposes the monitor as strongly as Kelly and who seemed to be leaning towards Quinn, changes course? What if he decides that the surest way to secure his legacy is to support Kelly?
Moreover, in light of the recent arrests of state and city officials on political corruption charges, a good-government crack may have opened to allow a white-knight non-politician to come forward. His supporters are already suggesting that white knight is Ray Kelly.
Edited by Donald Forst
_______________________________________________________________________
NYPD Stop, Question and Frisk
At Trial Over Police Tactic, Judge’s Focus Shifts >From Stopping to Frisking
By JOSEPH GOLDSTEIN — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The New York Times’
The young man was testifying about how the police had stopped him on his way to the bodega to buy milk. As he described being frisked, Judge Shira A. Scheindlin turned to him with a familiar question: Had the police officer put his hands in the man’s pockets?
Yes, the man said, which prompted a flurry of follow-up questions.
“Which pockets?” Judge Scheindlin asked. “Pants? Jacket? Shirt?”
The man, Nicholas Peart, 24, was certain the police had reached into his pants pockets.
“Front pockets or back pockets?” the judge asked.
As the trial over the New York Police Department’s use of the stop-and-frisk tactic enters its fourth week, Judge Scheindlin has made a point of questioning witnesses about whether officers limited their frisking to external pat-downs or engaged in searches far more intrusive than the police are authorized to conduct without further grounds for suspicion.
Her questions stand in contrast to much of the public debate over stop-and-frisk, which has focused on the first part of the procedure: the stop. Indeed, the core allegations of the lawsuit before Judge Scheindlin, Floyd v. City of New York, contend that the police initiate stops without the requisite level of suspicion, as a result of racial profiling.
Yet over several weeks of testimony it has become clear that Judge Scheindlin, who sits in Federal District Court in Manhattan and will be deciding the case in place of a jury, is also quite interested in what happened after people were stopped.
As lawyers have questioned witnesses, Judge Scheindlin has frequently jumped in with questions that seem directed at cataloging the precise nature of the frisking, and particularly, whether they expanded into searches of the plaintiffs’ pockets.
When one witness testified that his jacket pockets were searched, Judge Scheindlin wanted to know whether those pockets were on the outside or inside of the jacket. She wanted to know whether Mr. Peart’s sweatshirt contained pockets. (It did, but he could not remember whether they were searched.)
When a woman testified about being stopped on her way to a bank, Judge Scheindlin sought details about the police search of her shoulder bag.
“Did there come a time when the police officers searched the bag by going through the lining?” she asked.
In pursuing this line of questioning, Judge Scheindlin is also expanding the constitutional focus of the trial to include the other aspect of the Fourth Amendment at issue: the reasonableness of the police search, rather than just the reasonableness of the police’s initial detention of the person.
As a matter of law, the police are allowed to frisk for their safety when they have stopped someone whom they reasonably suspect of engaging in criminal activity and, in addition, is thought to be carrying a concealed weapon. In a landmark 1967 case recognizing the right of police officers to conduct stop-and-frisks, the Supreme Court held that frisking was for “the protection of the police officer and others nearby.” The court also said that “it must therefore be confined in scope to an intrusion reasonably designed to discover guns, knives, clubs, or other instruments for the assault of the police officer.”
Judge Scheindlin has directed similar questions toward officers, asking them about the circumstances that led them to frisk a person in the first place — slightly more than half the recorded street stops in New York City result in frisking — and what the frisking entailed.
“Could you explain how you conducted the frisk?” Judge Scheindlin asked one officer.
“I patted the outside part of his, of his clothing, ma’am,” the officer, Eric Hernandez, responded, testifying about a 2008 stop for suspected burglary in the Bronx.
In the landmark 1967 case, Terry v. Ohio, the Supreme Court observed that frisking, even when limited to a pat-down, was far more than a “petty indignity” unworthy of Fourth Amendment protection. Rather, the court found, it “is a serious intrusion upon the sanctity of the person, which may inflict great indignity and arouse strong resentment, and it is not to be undertaken lightly.”
Testimony from the trial is underscoring just how intrusive that experience can be from the perspective of the person being frisked. Mr. Peart, for instance, testified about an earlier stop that had led to his being ordered to the ground at gunpoint. He struggled for words to describe what happened next: “They patted over my basketball shorts and I was touched.”
“You could feel them touching you in the groin area?” Judge Scheindlin asked, seeking clarification and supplying the words. She later asked whether the frisk had extended “in the back, too, in the buttocks?” It had, Mr. Peart said.
While evidence regarding frisking suggested it had been focused on finding a firearm, other frisking described at the trial might have gone beyond what was necessary to conduct a search for weapons. During the stop of Mr. Peart on his way to the bodega, he was handcuffed and placed in a police car. There, an officer asked him if he had marijuana, took off his sneakers and patted down his socks, before releasing him, Mr. Peart testified. Courts have generally found that an officer’s frisking can expand into a search of a suspect’s pockets only if the pat-down reveals the presence of a weapon or some other contraband that the officer was able to immediately identify simply by patting it.
Indeed, in a previous stop-and frisk lawsuit decided in January, Judge Scheindlin’s opinion made a point of noting that in several of the contested stop-and-frisks, “the officer violated the Fourth Amendment by exceeding the constitutionally permissible bounds of a frisk.”
That case, Ligon v. City of New York, dealt only with stops outside certain residential buildings in the Bronx. Although the Ligon case was far smaller in scope than the current lawsuit, Judge Scheindlin’s decision in the earlier case appears to offer a blueprint of her thinking about the Fourth Amendment issues surrounding frisking.
_______________________________________________________________________
The Tossing of Gays, Lesbians, Bisexuals And the Transgendered
Arrests by the Fashion Police
By GINIA BELLAFANTE — Sunday, April 7th, 2013 ‘The New York Times’
NOTE: One I missed because I thought it was about just that: the fashion police. (How stupid of me.) - Mike
Here is a vignette from March 2013: A 24-year-old gay man named Yhatzine Lafontain is leaving a restaurant late at night with a friend on Roosevelt Avenue and 95th Street in Queens. Both are dressed as women, Mr. Lafontain in a jacket, short dress and heels. Exchanging goodbyes outside, they are approached by a man who tells them they look good.
In Mr. Lafontain’s account, they chatted briefly to avoid seeming rude and the man departed. Within a few minutes, an undercover police officer approached Mr. Lafontain and his friend and arrested them, suspecting them of prostitution. “We were surprised,” Mr. Lafontain told me, “because we had never talked to anyone about sex or money.”
I met Mr. Lafontain last week in Jackson Heights, not far from where his arrest had taken place, at the offices of Make the Road New York, a community-organizing group that works primarily with Latino immigrants. It has tried, along with various anti-violence projects in the city, to call attention to the perverse specifics of stop-and-frisk policing — a practice currently on trial in federal court in Lower Manhattan — as it applies to gay, lesbian and transgender New Yorkers who are black and Latino. Last fall, the group issued a report on policing in Jackson Heights, a neighborhood with a vibrant gay and transgender community and attendant club scene (and also a prostitution problem), and found in its survey of more than 300 residents that while 28 percent of straight respondents reported having been stopped by the police, 54 percent of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender respondents reported this kind of treatment.
Stories like Mr. Lafontain’s are told with stunning regularity in Jackson Heights, though the problem is not contained to that neighborhood and has, in fact, been documented in cities across the country.
Last week, Mitchyll Mora, a youth leader at a group called Streetwise and Safe told me about an experience he had last spring, on his way to a poetry reading on the Lower East Side. Dressed in a style he called non-gender-conforming — makeup, boots, long earrings — he was stopped and searched by the police for no reason he could understand. The police made him throw his hands up against the wall, invoked a gay slur and grabbed his buttocks, he said. “I should have tried to file a report, but it’s hard to feel empowered in this kind of situation,” he said.
Mr. Mora did recount this story in testimony to the City Council last October in support of the Community Safety Act, proposed legislation that would, among other things, require police officers to explain themselves to those they have stopped and provide them with a document, including the officer’s name and information on how to file a complaint, if necessary, at the conclusion of a police encounter.
The elasticity that officers in New York and elsewhere have been given to police quality-of-life violations has had the unfortunate effect of leaving transgender women, especially, susceptible to the charge that they must be engaged in sex work. What we have now, in some sense, is an actual fashion police — an attitude among some law enforcers that attaches criminality to sartorial choice. If you are a 35-year-old biological woman wearing the $715 metallic platform peep-toe pumps you just bought at Barneys to lunch at Café Boulud, you are well-dressed; if you were born Joaquin, have changed your name to Marisol and put yourself together with a similar verve, you are a prostitute.
Another component of this is the much-denounced use of condoms as evidence. “It can depend on which side of Sixth Avenue you’re standing on in the Village,” Andrea Ritchie, a lawyer with Streetwise and Safe, told me. “If you’re a student carrying condoms, you’re practicing good public health; if you’re a transgendered person of color, you’re a prostitute.”
Two years ago, Ms. Ritchie settled a lawsuit against the Police Department for a transgender client, Ryhannah Combs, who was arrested on suspicion of prostitution while making her way to a McDonald’s in the Village. The complaint said the police had listed nine condoms among her possessions even though Ms. Combs was not carrying any at the time of her arrest.
Ms. Ritchie’s client had moved to New York from California envisioning New York as the most enlightened place on earth. So had Johanna Vasquez, who at age 16 came from El Salvador, where, born male, she always felt the instinct to be female and suffered terrible abuse and prejudice because of it, she told me. Two years ago, she said, she was stopped by police officers at 2 a.m. outside a nightclub on Roosevelt Avenue, waiting for a taxi. She pleaded guilty to charges that she was loitering with intent to sell herself, feeling that she had no other choice, she said, but she denies having any involvement in prostitution. She had been similarly accused in Texas, she told me, a matter that resulted in her deportation years earlier.
Last year, the Police Department responded positively to requests from advocates that it revise its Patrol Guide to ensure that transgender men and women receive more sensitive treatment. But Ms. Vasquez continues to feel constrained. She told me tearfully, “I don’t go out at night, and I fear that even if I go to the pharmacy I’ll get arrested.”
_______________________________________________________________________
Witness: NYPD officers feel more pressure to stop, frisk
By JOHN RILEY — Saturday, April 6th, 2013; ‘New York Newsday’ / Melville, L.I.
A survey of retired NYPD officers showed dramatic increases in the pressure to perform street stops during the last decade, an expert testified Friday in a federal court challenge to stop-and-frisk tactics.
Eli Silverman, a John Jay College of Criminal Justice professor appearing for the plaintiffs, said only 9.1 percent of officers who retired before 1995 reported pressure to conduct more stop-and-frisks.
That figure rose to 19.1 percent for officers retiring from 1995 to 2001, and then to 35.1 percent for those retiring since 2002. The survey, conducted over the Internet last year, was based on responses from 1,962 officers.
Plaintiffs in the case claim pressure to increase stop-and-frisk activity under Police Commissioner Ray Kelly and Mayor Michael Bloomberg has led to stops that don't meet the Supreme Court standard of "reasonable suspicion" and unfairly target minorities.
They want Manhattan U.S. District Judge Shira Scheindlin to rein in use of the tactic.
_______________________________________________________________________
Activists Petition Against ‘Abusive Practices’ In The NYPD
NYPD Responds: Cops Are Being Used As 'Political Football'
By Unnamed Author(s) (CBS News - New York) — Sunday, April 7th, 2013; 5:06 p.m. EDT
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — Members of an activist group circulated a petition at posts around the city Sunday — with the goal of ending what the group called “abusive practices” in the New York City Police Department.
The Police Reform Organizing Project of the Urban Justice Center was seeking at least another 5,000 signatures on its petition, after already collecting more than 20,000.
The goal, the group said, is “demonstrating to policy makers that a broad-based constituency of city residents are concerned about abusive police practices and are calling for meaningful change.”
“The petition calls on the city’s political leaders – the mayor, the speaker of the City Council – to enact sweeping reforms in Police Department practices, so to end stop-and-frisk, to abolish the quota system, and to create an outside independent monitor,” said Robert Gangi, director of the Police Reform Organizing Project.
Gangi told 1010 WINS’ the activists were also collecting personal stories of police injustice.
The group called current police practices “harsh” and “racially biased.”
“We urge New Yorkers to join our campaign to stop the NYPD’s harsh and unjust practices that do harm to the city’s residents, especially people from low income communities of color, on a daily basis,” Gangi added in a news release. “The city’s police should serve and protect people, rather than engage in stop-and-frisk and other tactics that harass and, in effect, criminalize them.”
The NYPD issued a response to the campaign, saying the group was using hardworking police officers to make a political statement.
“Police officers work hard to keep the city safe, often risking and sometimes losing their own lives in the process. Regrettably, they are also used as a political football, especially in an election year, as appears to be the case here,” NYPD Deputy Commissioner Paul J. Browne said in the statement.
The reform group set up posts with the petition Sunday at Tompkins Square Park in the East Village; 125th Street and Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard in Harlem; Parkside and Flatbush avenues and the Utica Avenue A and C train station in Brooklyn; and Jamaica Center and the junction of Parsons and Archer avenues in Queens.
_______________________________________________________________________
Assessment: Wall Street Journal's Puff Piece Interview of Raymond Kelly
Ray Kelly Changed "Nothing" About How NYPD Spies On Muslims
By Christopher Robbins — Sunday, April 7th, 2013; 6:20 p.m. ‘The Gothamist’/ New York, NY
Perhaps emboldened by The Man Upstairs, or the Cheneys and the Noonans that grace its Very Serious pages (or a recent dip in crime), NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly gave an extremely candid interview to the Wall Street Journal. Kelly is asked how the department's surveillance methods have changed in the wake of a Pultizer Prize-winning investigative series and the revelation that the very same surveillance program has generated zero leads. His reply: "Nothing," which appears to be exactly what James Freeman, the assistant editor of the paper's editorial board, chooses for his follow-up question.
Instead of citing a recent report noting the chilling, discriminatory effect the department's practices have had on Muslims living in New York City, we get a softball about whether Kelly will run for mayor so we can all just sleep easy and never worry about any little thing ever again.
We also receive a candid warning against getting conned by some two-bit, Constitutional Three Card Monte [ http://www.ccrjustice.org/files/Pls%20Remedy%20Brief.ECF%20Version.3%204%202013.pdf ] that conniving civil liberties scam artists are baiting us with (also pay no mind to this memo).
"I think one of the biggest scams in law enforcement is the monitor," Mr. Kelly says. The plaintiffs in the stop-and-frisk suit have demanded such an overseer to watch the police. Mr. Kelly describes how the practice has worked under an "extremely aggressive" U.S. Justice Department going "around to different cities," where "they'll find some sort of discriminatory pattern in their minds."
The feds threaten to sue the cities unless they agree to a civil-rights monitor, and most cities agree, to avoid the cost of litigation. "So it'll be a politically acceptable lawyer who will be put in there and will always find something wrong, because they get paid. A city like Detroit pays, I don't know, a couple million dollars a year, whatever, to this firm and guess what? Nothing is ever right, because if I find everything's right then I stop getting paid."
Indeed, Kelly prefers the current "politically acceptable" lawyer, his friend Michael Armstrong.
Regarding the discussion over whether the NYPD needs an Inspector General to oversee department policies and make recommendations (which, contrary to comments made by the commissioner and Mayor Bloomberg, is all an IG would have the authority to do), Kelly is even more revealing when speaking in the WSJ's video portion of the interview:
"[An Inspector General is] certainly poorly thought out. It creates a position that reports to—actually the commission of investigation, who reports to the mayor but has the ability to look at policies and practices, put everything on the internet. It is unworkable and unwise in my judgment."
Why wouldn't the NYPD want "everything on the internet?"
_______________________________________________________________________
The Best Quotes From Ray Kelly's Interview With The Wall Street Journal
By John Surico — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The Villiage Voice’ / Manhattan
It's been a rough couple of weeks for the head of the Boys in Blue.
The NYPD's stop-and-frisk policy finds itself in a serious constitutional dilemma in a Downtown court, bringing light to the shadowy legacy of the practice. The Community Safety Act, which would establish an Inspector General for the cop force, has come under fire from the city's greatest political players after receiving endorsement from Christine Quinn. And even the fact that the agency needs an Inspector General says enough about Ray Kelly and his Department right now.
Well, in response to all of this, Kelly sat down with the Wall Street Journal to give his take on... well, everything. There's a few snippets from this thing that need to be brought to everyone's attention.
On the media: "They are hellbent on finding anything they can wrong with the department."
On why stop-and-frisk is fineeeeeee: "We put our officers right in the middle of where the problems are, mostly minority areas... You develop very quickly a sense of who's doing right and who's doing wrong--and who's carrying a gun."
And what would happen without: "You'd need another 50,000 cops."
On the Inspector General idea: "I think one of the biggest scams in law enforcement is the monitor."
On social media law enforcement: "There is a social media component, because these kids, these crews, are bragging and telegraphing what they're going to do in terms of who they're going to shoot, who they're going to kill. They go in front of the [intended victim's] house and they'll stand in front of it and get a picture. And they try to play a game with code. But we break the code."
On surveillance of the Muslim community: "There are other investigations of young people like this that are ongoing right now. We see ourselves as the number one target and we have this stream of young men who want to come here and kill us."
And what's being changed about it: "Nothing."
_______________________________________________________________________
Sketching Raymond Kelly for His Wall Street Journal Puff Piece
Kinky Boots and Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly
By Ken Fallin (Sketch Artist) — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The Huffington Post’ / New York, NY
(Edited for Ray Kelly)
My drawing for this weekend's Wall Street Journal opinion page is of New York City Police Commissioner, Raymond Kelly. I had drawn Mr. Kelly previously for the WSJ, but it's always fun, and sometimes a challenge to go back and draw the same person again.
Mr. Kelly has great and distinctive features to draw. Here is a man with a serious look, projected in his stern eyes and firm jaw. In most of the photographs I found for reference, he looked like he was frowning. However, my editor did not want him with a turned down expression on his face, so, I had to use my imagination and attempt and make him a little less serious.
I wish I could tell you that these drawings flow from my pencil, but the truth is that most of the time I use up a lot of eraser to capture that "spontaneous" combination of shapes and random lines to create an interesting drawing.
_______________________________________________________________________
Ray and the ‘Swells’
Edited from:
She’s got style
By CINDY ADAMS — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The New York Post’
(Gossip)
NYC COP-in-chief Ray Kelly’s NYC Police Foundation dinner honoring NYC builder Arnold Fisher raised $3 million.
Best-dressed: Mrs. Veronica Kelly, whose “outfit malfunction” meant pulling something fast from her closet in black silk.
Also NYC chairlady Valerie Salembier, who pulled a bronze ball gown from NYC’s Joanna Mastroianni.
And best guest: NYC’s Jon Stewart, waving unpaid parking tickets and asking Kelly: “Do you validate?”
_______________________________________________________________________
NYPD report: Nighttime in NYC is a time to kill
By ANTHONY M. DESTEFANO — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘New York Newsday’ / Melville, L.I.
In New York City, you wait till the midnight hour to see who might be killed -- that's when close to 40 percent of the homicides took place last year, a new report says.
The murders happened between the hours of 11 p.m. and 5 a.m., when drugs, alcohol and aggression can become a deadly mix, according to an analysis prepared last week by the NYPD.
While there were just 419 homicides in 2012, the lowest number of homicides in 50 years, killings still followed the historical nocturnal pattern of bloodshed.
In "Murder In New York City 2012," NYPD statisticians reported that while homicides might take place at any hour, they started rising after 5 p.m. and peaked between 11 p.m. and 1:30 a.m., trailing off around 5 a.m., the data showed.
Given that people who are active at night may be taking drugs or imbibing alcohol well into early morning hours, they are more likely to get into situations where homicides occur, said NYPD spokesman Paul Browne. Nighttime also provides more cover for killers, particularly since fewer vehicles are on the street, said one expert.
Joseph L. Giacalone, a retired NYPD detective sergeant and adjunct professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, said some victims put themselves at risk. He calls their deaths "victim precipitated" killings.
"Sometimes they run in circles they shouldn't be running in," said Giacalone. "Most of our victims are into something."
The NYPD study seems to bear out Giacalone's observation. Some 42 percent of the homicides last year involved a dispute or revenge element, while another 11 percent involved drugs and 9 percent was related to gang activity, said police.
Victims still were mostly black and Hispanic, a pattern that has existed for at least the past two decades. Some 60 percent of the homicide victims were black in 2012, compared to 27 percent Hispanic, 9 percent white and 4 percent Asian, according to NYPD statistics. Those killed were mostly men, accounting for 84 percent of all victims, compared to 16 percent for women.
Of the homicides in 2012, 57 percent involved shootings, 21 percent stabbings and 11 percent bludgeonings. Brooklyn was the leading borough for killings at 36 percent, followed by the Bronx at 27 percent, Queens 20 percent, Manhattan 15 percent and Staten Island with only 2 percent.
Browne noted that homicides were already down by 29.8 percent this year from 2012: 68 killings through April 4 compared to 97 in the same period last year. Victims this year have been 61 percent black and 27 percent Hispanic, he noted.
Weather is also a factor, said Giacalone, and the pace of killings is likely to increase with temperatures rising, a historical trend.
Murder in New York City 2012
The NYPD last year reported 419 people classified as homicide victims in New York City, a decline of 19 percent from 2011 and the lowest number in over 50 years. Here are some percentages related to city homicides in 2012.
Motive
1. Dispute/Revenge 42 percent
2. Drug 11 percent
3. Domestic 18 percent
4. Robbery/Burglary 6 percent
5. Gang 9 percent
6. Unknown 13 percent
7. Other 1 percent
Borough
1. Brooklyn 36 percent
2. Bronx 27 percent
3. Queens 20 percent
4. Manhattan 15 percent
5. Staten Island 2 percent
Who
1. Black 60 percent
2. Hispanic 27 percent
3. White 9 percent
4. Asian 4 percent
How
1. Shot 57 percent
2. Stabbed 21 percent
3. Bludgeoned 11 percent
4. Physical force 6 percent
5. Other 5 percent
Source: "Murder in New York City 2012, NYPD
_______________________________________________________________________
Several NYC police precincts only issued a handful of speeding tickets last year: data
By KATE BRIQUELET — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The New York Post’
Give us a brake!
As Mayor Bloomberg battles the state Senate for speed cameras around schools, lead-footed drivers are getting a free ride.
Several police precincts issued only a handful of speeding violations last year — with one station failing to write a single ticket, according to data from Transportation Alternatives.
An exclusive look at the advocacy group’s upcoming report shows police in the 14th Precinct of Midtown South gave out zero tickets.
Police in the 18th Precinct in Midtown North issued one ticket all year, while cops in one Upper West precinct doled out just four. The 83rd Precinct in Bushwick wrote eight tickets.
“Far too many speeding drivers are getting away with putting New Yorkers’ lives at risk,” said Michael Murphy, spokesman for Transportation Alternatives.
Last month, state lawmakers earned the ire of Mayor Bloomberg after failing to authorize 40 speed cameras for city school zones in the state budget.
In 2012, 274 people died in New York City traffic, up from 245 in 2011, and speeding caused a quarter of all fatalities. Yet only 10 of 74 precincts wrote more than one speeding ticket a day.
When Transportation Alternatives staffers took their radar guns around the city, they found NYPD enforcement not keeping up.
In East Elmhurst, police issued 177 speeding tickets all year, but the group found 237 drivers going 10 mph above the limit in an eight-hour span.
Midwood officers wrote 129 speeding tickets last year, while advocates found 30 speeders in two hours.
“The speed limit is barely and arbitrarily enforced in the city,” Murphy said.
The precincts with the fewest violations included Midtown, the Upper West Side, the Lower East Side and the East Village.
Each precinct has about five summons officers who issue parking and traffic violations, and only one is trained to use a radar gun, an NYPD supervisor told The Post.
“Speeding is not a main factor in accidents,” he said, adding that drunken driving and inattentive driving account for more accidents in areas like Midtown.
An NYPD spokeswoman told The Post speeding isn’t more of a priority because officers are deployed to other crimes.
She said Midtown and other congested areas clock fewer tickets because there aren’t as many opportunities to speed.
Speeding tickets issued by precinct in 2012:
MOST
Elmhurst, Queens 4,130
Central Bronx 1,649
South Shore, SI 1,353
Mid-Island, SI 1,165
North Shore, SI 943
Harlem 633
FEWEST
Midtown South 0
Midtown North 1
Upper West Side 4
Midtown East 7
Bushwick 8
*Source: Transportation Alternatives
Additional reporting by Brad Hamilton
_______________________________________________________________________
Pawn biz refuses to give cops info (Updated)
By KATHIANNE BONIELLO — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The New York Post’
They refuse to be pawns to a police state.
A city pawnbroker company is suing the NYPD in Brooklyn federal court for $61 million, claiming it’s being bullied to reveal transactions in a national database.
The Gem Pawnbrokers chain says cops harassed staffers at its Brooklyn and Queens shops, threatened them and even slapped them with penny-ante violations in an effort to get the shops to sign up for a service called LeadsOnline that enables law enforcement to track goods and the people who pawn them, a suit charges.
Pawn shops are required by law to keep, and let cops inspect, records of what they buy and sell, the date and time of the transaction, along with the seller’s physical description, name and address.
LeadsOnline collects this information in an online database police can access from their desks, but pawnshops aren’t required to participate in the system.
Gem’s owners say they stopped using the Texas-based LeadsOnline because they feared the service violated federal privacy laws, which they are required to follow.
Because pawnbrokers often loan people money in exchange for merchandise, they are similar to banks and required to keep most transaction information private from the general public, Gem lawyer Paul Solda said.
The lawyer charged that police are using LeadsOnline to circumvent the spirit of the law when it comes to pawnshops. Instead of inspecting Gem’s books on a regular basis for irregularities, wanted suspects or known stolen items, police are simply fishing for arrests by zeroing in on the names of ex-cons.
“What the police were doing was calling every other day and asking them to put criminal holds on [merchandise]” without court paperwork, Solda said.
Police say keeping track of pawnshop business is a key weapon in catching crooks fencing stolen property.
Gem, with more than 20 stores in the five boroughs, “has been targeted by the NYPD for the last two years plus, because they got off LeadsOnline,” the lawyer said.
Staffers were “subjected to constant threats, intimidation and disruptive actions,” according to the suit.
Police allegedly made clear the crackdown would “only end when and if they cede to the demands of the NYPD and ‘become compliant,’ ” Gem charges in court documents.
About 2,100 law-enforcement agencies across the country use LeadsOnline, says the service, which bills itself as helping police solve crimes.
Solda said cops issued more than half a dozen misdemeanor violations to their shops in Brooklyn and Queens, all of which have been dismissed in court.
He slammed the NYPD’s alleged actions as “shocking” and said they reveal an “inherent prejudice” that assumes pawnshops are a hotbed of criminal activity.
“What the police don’t understand is that, 99.9 percent of the time, these are good people doing good transactions,” he said.
LeadsOnline did not return a request for comment. The city had not yet reviewed the lawsuit, a Law Department spokeswoman said.
_______________________________________________________________________
Cop grid tribute (Updated)
By NATASHA VELEZ — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The New York Post’
TRIBUTE: John Pritchard, father of fallen NYPD Officer Joe Pritchard, holds his son's jersey high before a football game between the NYPD and Long Island Panthers in Joe's hometown of Lindenhurst.
The NYPD football team played a game last night in memory of a Manhattan cop and teammate recently killed in a car crash on Long Island.
Joseph Pritchard, 30, of North Babylon died March 25 in a crash on the Long Island Expressway.
The NYPD’s team defeated the Long Island Panthers 7-0.
"It was a defensive game. Joe was a defensive player and he wouldn't of had it any other way," said NYPD team general manager Tony Hernandez.
Pritchard's jersey was retired before the game. Joe's father, John Pritchard, held his son's jersey high at a tribute before the game.
Lisa Sforza, Joe's sister, was in awe of the team and community's support.
"Everything they've done for our family, for Joe, it's bitter sweet," she said. "It's great how the community came together to remember him. This is how much he was loved."
George Burke, a member of the team for eight years, recalled the fallen officer as "a great friend, a great team mate and a great cop."
"It was an honor to get this game together," Burke said. "We did this for our best friend. We're going to miss him and we love him."
The Lindenhurst Touchdown Club collected donations at the game, and shops all over Lindenhurst donated goods and gift certificates to help raise money for the Joseph Pritchard scholarship fund.
_______________________________________________________________________
City bills cyclist $1,200 for damage to police car that struck him
By DAN MANGAN — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The New York Post’
The city added a thousand-dollar insult to an already painful injury when it demanded that a Brooklyn cyclist pay for damage to the police car that struck and sent him flying.
“I think it’s preposterous,” said Justin Johnsen, 31, who received the $1,263.01 bill from the city last month for the Nov. 5 accident on Flushing Avenue that left him with deep cuts that required stitches.
“I was upset. I was in kind of disbelief that they were going to send this letter after four months or so and ask me to pay damages for their vehicle, when they hit me when I was on a bicycle,” added Johnsen, who was not ticketed for the crash.
The case is at least the third in recent months in which the city has billed people for damages to police cars that hit people.
And after The Post made inquiries about Johnsen’s case, it became at least the third time the city abruptly dropped such a stunning demand for money.
“They should be sending an apology letter instead of a bill,” fumed lawyer Daniel Flanzig, who took the case pro bono after learning that the city was threatening to sue Johnsen if he didn’t cough up the cash.
As he usually does, the South Williamsburg resident was cycling to his design-engineer job in Red Hook at around 8:30 a.m. when the accident occurred.
“I had left the bike lane to make a left turn, and I looked behind me and saw that it was clear, and the farthest car was a fair distance,” he said.
Johnsen said he signaled to make the turn onto North Elliott Place from Flushing Avenue, but before taking the turn, he said, he “was swiped by this car on my left side.”
The 2009 Ford Taurus — which turned out to be an unmarked police car — knocked him from the bike.
“I didn’t feel too good . . . I got some big gashes to my elbows,” said Johnsen, who went to New York Methodist Hospital after the cops called for an ambulance.
Although the two cops in the car — including the driver, Sgt. Conrad DePinto, — were “pretty friendly” to him after the crash, they were “not apologetic at all,” Johnsen said.
He added that he hadn’t considered suing the police, even after racking up several hundred dollars in medical bills.
_______________________________________________________________________
Kelly Promises Female Mexican Police Chief Protection While in New York
Marisol Valles Garcia, 20-something Mexican police chief, comes to New York for play
'So Go the Ghosts of Mexico,' by Matthew Paul Olmos, is based on the daring life of the Praxedis, Mexico top cop after no man stepped up. The play premieres Thursday at La MaMa at 74 E. Fourth St.
By Ginger Adams Otis — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The New York Daily News’
The “bravest woman in Mexico” is coming to the mean streets of New York.
Marisol Valles Garcia — the baby-faced former police chief of a violent, drug-riddled Mexican border town — will celebrate the opening of a biographical play about her life when it opens this weekend in the East Village.
And the NYPD is ready to protect the 23-year-old, who made headlines worldwide in 2010 when she agreed to become the police chief of tiny Praxedis, Mexico, after no man in her town had the guts to step up.
“If she needs some sort of protection, we’ll provide it,” said NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly about Valles, who remains a target of murderous Mexican drug cartels.
Valles’ daring one-woman battle against corruption and violence is the centerpiece of the play, “So Go the Ghosts of Mexico ,” by Matthew Paul Olmos, that premieres Thursday at La MaMa at 74 E. Fourth St.
Valles will attend a Sunday matinee of the play, which was inspired by her global impact, Olmos said.
“The significance of her ideas — that we could solve these conflicts by community improvements instead of armed conflict — are still being felt,” said the California playwright.
The soft-spoken young mother, who was a criminal justice student, took the top cop job after out-of-control cartels had beheaded the last police chief of Praxedis — a common occurrence in the drug-torn country.
“I want my son to live in a different community to the one we have today. I want people to be able to go out without fear, as it was before,” Valles told reporters after pinning on her badge.
She stood up to the cartels with the barest of resources — one patrol car, four guns and 13 officers, nine of whom were women.
Valles opted not to carry a weapon and didn’t even have a security detail. She earned $640 a month for putting her life on the line.
She was forced to flee Praxedis mere months after becoming police chief — taking her toddler son and husband with her — because of harassment from the drug lords.
After one particularly threatening phone call from the Chapo Guzman cartel — demanding Valles drive to Ciudad Juarez to meet with the narcos or her husband and son would suffer — she and her family jumped into a friend’s pickup truck and made the 15-minute journey across the border into America with only the clothes on their backs.
She’s now living in El Paso, Texas, and seeking asylum, according to her lawyer, Carlos Spector.
_______________________________________________________________________
MTA restores cops at bridges & tunnels
By NATASHA VELEZ and REBECCA HARSHBARGER — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The New York Post’
The MTA has redeployed bridge-and-tunnel cops to most of its city crossings, less than two weeks after The Post revealed their numbers had been slashed, law-enforcement sources said.
The agency is now stationing one officer in a patrol car at most of the nine crossings, although coverage is still spotty at some bridges.
Before the cuts, there were bridge-and-tunnel cops in at least two patrol cars stationed at each of the crossings, which handle nearly 1 million drivers a day.
“Every place is short-staffed right now,” griped a law-enforcement source. “Manpower is pretty low.
“There is a big terrorist threat to the City of New York. That’s no secret, and I think it’s irresponsible.”
In addition to helping thwart terror, bridge-and-tunnel cops’ duties include stopping potential bridge leapers. They also make collars for unlicensed driving, as well as for drug and gun possession.
The MTA oversees the Brooklyn-Battery and Queens-Midtown tunnels, as well as the Verrazano, Triborough, Throgs Neck, Bronx-Whitestone, Henry Hudson, Marine Parkway-Gil Hodges and Cross Bay Veterans bridges.
Last month, the MTA cut patrol cops posted at the crossings and had police from speed enforcement do both jobs, sources said. But patrol cops have now been put back at most of the crossings, sources say.
An MTA spokeswoman said no patrol cars or personnel had been eliminated, although she would not discuss specifics.
“They are being deployed in a more efficient manner to better serve and fit in with our security plan,” said the spokeswoman, Judith Glave.
Still, on weekdays, there are no patrols on the Whitestone or Throgs Neck bridges between midnight and 8 a.m., sources said.
And on the Throgs Neck, patrols are sporadic even through the rest of the day.
On one recent busy Friday night, a Post reporter spent four hours at the bridge without seeing a single bridge-and-tunnel officer — just several parked patrol cars with no cops. One patrol car was used to block a toll lane.
A toll-booth worker said she hadn’t seen any bridge-and-tunnel cops the whole day.
Asked about security, she pointed at the empty cars and joked, “We have security. There they are.”
Sources say MTA brass has been cutting costs by eliminating security positions created or expanded after 9/11, even though the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority generates $800 million a year in revenue for the agency.
Some manned security posts, for instance, have been replaced with surveillance cameras, such as at the Midtown and Brooklyn-Battery tunnels.
_______________________________________________________________________
Long Island
Controversial Nassau precinct closing postponed
By MATTHEW CHAYES — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘New York Newsday’ / Melville, L.I.
Nassau County's final round of hotly debated police consolidations -- merging the Baldwin-based First Precinct into the Seaford-based Seventh Precinct -- has been postponed indefinitely.
And ultimately, the merger might never happen as planned, according to department officials. Flooding to the Seventh Precinct building from superstorm Sandy has led officials to reconsider how policing on the county's South Shore should be managed.
"It's a possibility that we may realign the South Shore among three precincts rather than two precincts," First Deputy Commissioner Thomas C. Krumpter said. "It may be that, at the end of the day, we build a new building at a better location."
Officials have no time frame or location in mind for a new precinct, he said, but a decision would "definitely" be no later than a year from now.
Not ruled out yet
The county hasn't fully ruled out the consolidation at this time, "but we're taking a look, in light of the fact that the Seventh Precinct, where it's currently situated, had floods that surpassed it during the storm," Krumpter said Thursday. "The buildings are older buildings, so we're looking at the locations."
The decision to postpone the consolidation was made a day earlier by Police Commissioner Thomas V. Dale and County Executive Edward P. Mangano.
The original merger plan, approved in March 2012 along party lines by the county legislature, was the most dramatic change in the Nassau County Police Department's 88-year history. Eight precincts were to be consolidated into four, with the closed precincts converted into lighter-staffed "community policing centers."
Opponents packed the legislative chamber in Mineola during the vote, hissing and catcalling, shouting "coward" and "traitor" at Republican lawmakers as they approved the consolidation plan. The opponents said the closures would increase response times, overcrowd precincts and jeopardize public safety.
Proponents said the closures save money for the cash-strapped county, whose finances are in state receivership. They say that the plan does not reduce the number of cops actually fighting crime because the number of patrol sectors has not changed. The county police district is divided into about 180 sectors, each with a dedicated vehicle on patrol within it.
The first three mergers are "working well," saving money without jeopardizing public safety, Krumpter said.
The Second Precinct, in Woodbury, absorbed the Eighth, in Levittown, last spring. The Third Precinct, in Williston Park, absorbed the Sixth, in Manhasset, during the summer. Four months later, the Fourth, in Hewlett, absorbed the Fifth, in Elmont.
Consolidating the First and Seventh, which combined serve nearly 307,000 people, had twice been postponed. It was originally scheduled for Nov. 1 -- three days after Sandy roared into Long Island.
"We knew the storm was coming. We weren't moving. We postponed it," Krumpter said.
The department in December again postponed the merger, citing the need for the county to dedicate itself to storm recovery efforts, including meeting strict deadlines for reimbursement by the federal government for more than $20 million of Sandy-related police costs.
A planned farewell ceremony at the First Precinct with current and former staffers was canceled.
"We were actually refocused on actually dealing with the aftermath of the storm -- and we're still focused on that at this point," Krumpter said. "Trying to do a merger at the same time as trying to do all the record-keeping related to the storm is a little problematic."
But even once that record-keeping is completed, the storm is causing the department to consider how Mother Nature affects its ability to police, he said.
"In light of the 100-year storm -- one of the massive storms in the history of Nassau County -- we're looking at things a little bit differently," Krumpter said. "Is this the new weather that we're going to deal with?"
Goal was saving $20M
The original consolidation plan was created to save $20 million annually, mostly in savings achieved by the reduction in personnel such as supervisors. If the last planned merger ultimately does not occur, the department would have to make up the $3 million or $4 million cost of additional personnel someplace else, Krumpter said. But he called that possibility a "worst-case scenario."
"It wasn't about closing precincts. It was about eliminating positions," he said of the consolidation plan.
Democrats who were opposed to Mangano's merger plan seized word of the latest postponement as an opportunity to again challenge the entire consolidation plan.
"The fact that he has changed a plan midway through -- it defeats the purpose of having a plan in the first place," said Legis. Carrié Solages (D-Elmont), whose district includes the downgraded Fifth Precinct. "If the objective of this plan is to save money, then we have to ask ourselves, 'Have we saved money?' And when we look at issues of crime not being properly addressed there's another cost to that -- an economic cost."
_______________________________________________________________________
New York State
AR-15 is front, center in NY SAFE Act debate
Gun called a modern-day musket; others cite lethality
By Jimmy Vielkind — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The Albany Times Union’ / Albany, NY
If you've seen any war movie or walked past an on-duty soldier, you've seen this rifle: an AR-15, the civilian version of the semiautomatic rifle that remains standard issue for the U.S. military.
But as Kevin Zacharewicz held his AR-15 alongside other rifles in his Round Lake store, Zack's Sports, he chuckled and called it "my big bad wolf."
Depending on where you sit in the debate over appropriate forms of gun control, you could look at an AR-15 and ask one of two questions.
The first: What legitimate purpose is there for anybody to own a gun designed for the military?
The second: What makes it any more dangerous or problematic than any other kind of firearm?
"I can't answer that question. I was raised having these guns," said Zacharewicz, a 41-year-old Clifton Park native. "Why do people golf? Why do you have a standard transmission versus an automatic? I really don't know."
Rochester Police Chief James Sheppard says guns like the AR-15 are just deadlier, period, and should be banned for the same reason that a kitchen knife is legal but a switchblade is not.
"These rifles are basically replicas of military armament, and they are designed to efficiently kill people," Sheppard said. "In civilian life, that's not something you need or want."
After high-profile shootings in Aurora, Colo.; Newtown, Conn.; and the Rochester suburb of Webster, President Barack Obama last week renewed his push for federal lawmakers to tighten gun laws.
The Capital Region, too, has seen rifle-wielding outlaws set off dangerous situations. On Jan. 10, 2009, a gang member wanted in Hartford fired 28 rounds at State Police with a semiautomatic rifle during a traffic stop on I-90 in East Greenbush. The resulting standoff left the man dead and shut down the highway for hours. On Dec. 14, 1994, a man with a bolt-action rifle held a classroom full of University at Albany students hostage for several hours. He shot one student as he was wrestled to the ground; a law enforcement official said the outcome could have been worse if the rifle had been semiautomatic.
Congress is considering a more stringent requirement for background checks and debating the renewal of all or part of the pre-2004 assault weapons ban that prohibited the sale of automatic weapons like the AK-47 and Uzi.
New York did not wait, and tightened gun control laws at the urging of Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo at the start of this year with the passage of the NY SAFE Act.
The act broadened the definition of banned assault weapons, reduced the amount of rounds that can be possessed in a gun magazine, increased penalties for illegal gun possession, reduced public access to gun permit information, and required mental health professionals to report concerns about a gun-owning patient who poses a risk of harming himself or others.
New York law already included a ban on "assault weapons," which were defined as semiautomatic rifles with the ability to accept a detachable magazine and two items on a list of prohibited features: a flash suppressor, a folding or collapsible stock, a pistol grip, a thumbhole stock, a second handgrip for the non-trigger hand, a bayonet mount or a grenade launcher.
Under the act, the ban would be triggered by any one of those features. Their sale or transfer is restricted, and gun owners must register them with the state by next January, or be subject to a misdemeanor charge and possible forfeiture.
Gun owners have steeled themselves in opposition to the act since it was passed, staging rallies in upstate cities and at the Capitol. Forums, including two last week in Brunswick and Canandaigua, draw hundreds of concerned people. Roughly four dozen upstate county legislatures have passed resolutions opposing the new law.
Tom King, head of the New York State Rifle and Pistol Association, joined Assembly Minority Leader Brian Kolb and other law enforcement officials for a Thursday night session at the Inn on the Lake in Canandaigua. King, an East Greenbush resident, called the law "ludicrous" and listened as most of the standing-room-only crowd asked questions about whether the guns they currently owned would be snared in the expanded definition.
King and others say the Second Amendment's right to bear arms is being unfairly abridged. They see the AR-15 as the modern version of the muskets that the Founding Fathers had in mind when they wrote the law.
"They're fun to shoot — that's what most legal gun owners will tell you," King told a reporter. "Why should we give them up? What part of the First Amendment do you want to give up?"
His group is suing the state in federal court, arguing that the expanded ban is "not even rational" because the features targeted don't make a rifle any more dangerous and simply reduce "discomfort" while shooting. The state is due to file a legal reply on April 18.
Assemblyman Bill Nojay, R-Rochester, is a plaintiff in that suit. At a gun club in his Finger Lakes district, he said the law creates an "enforceability problem" because features can be easily reconfigured. Further, these guns are not commonly used to commit crimes, though they are increasingly used in mass shootings, according to Onondaga County District Attorney Bill Fitzpatrick.
The act's ban covered the guns used in Webster and in East Greenbush, law enforcement officials said.
At his store, Zacharewicz said the AR-15 was one of the most popular rifles in stock. He said he would sell roughly 10 a month — at a cost of roughly $1,000 each, depending on the manufacturer.
They are light and accurate, agreed David Lahah, a customer who works as a firearms instructor in Albany, and needed for some "service rifle" shooting contests.
"I've got these ARs set up for different competitions, and those guns have taken me all over the world," he said.
Cuomo has said he believes the new law will "save lives," and he notes it does not force any gun owner to surrender their firearms. But where's the right balance? And should we be afraid of the big, bad wolf?
_______________________________________________________________________
New Jersey
New county police force in Camden set to begin patrols
By Unnamed Author(s) (The Associated Press) — Monday, April 8th, 2013; 10:50 a.m. EDT
CAMDEN — More than 30 members of the new Camden County Police Department Metro Division will be deployed on the streets of New Jersey's most impoverished city.
In addition, 23 new officers will begin field training with former members of the Camden police department. Those officers will share their experience of patrolling the streets.
The new Camden County police force plans to take over patrols from the city force on April 30.
The county force has offered jobs to 140 current officers and 120 outside officers.
The new operation is to have 400 workers including police and civilians.
_______________________________________________________________________
U.S.A.
States look to tax guns, ammo
Some states and counties are studying whether to tax gun and ammunition purchases. Supporters hope to discourage gun violence or pay for damage it causes.
By Judy Keen — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘USA Today’
CHICAGO — Cook County, Ill., this month began collecting a $25 tax on gun purchases, and at least six states are considering new taxes on firearms or ammunition as a way to help pay for the consequences of gun violence.
The Cook County tax applies to purchases in Chicago's suburbs, but not the city. The tax is expected to raise $600,000 a year, which will help pay for indigent gunshot victims' medical care at county-run Stroger Hospital.
Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, a Democrat, says 30% of the hospital's trauma patients have gunshot wounds and it costs about $52,000 for initial treatment for each. The tax won't necessarily serve as a deterrent to gun buyers, she says, but "it's an acknowledgment that we as a society pay a terrible price for the proliferation of guns."
A group of gun sellers and owners sued to block the gun tax, saying it violates the Second Amendment right to bear arms. Circuit Court Judge David Atkins denied a temporary restraining order, saying the lawsuit didn't show "that this right is threatened by the tax."
Gun and ammunition purchases are subject to local sales taxes, and manufacturers pay a federal excise tax — 10% for pistols and revolvers, 11% for other guns, shells and cartridges — that funds wildlife programs.
Lawrence Keane, general counsel of the National Shooting Sports Foundation, which represents gun manufacturers, distributors and retailers, says proposals for new gun taxes are "a coordinated effort by gun-control groups to try to impose a poll tax on the exercise of the Second Amendment."
Such taxes don't create safer communities, Keane says. "They burden and frustrate the exercise of a constitutional right," he says.
Legislation introduced in Congress would add a 10% tax to handgun purchases to pay for gun buybacks and other programs. Bills creating new taxes are pending in state legislatures in New Jersey and Washington state. Elsewhere:
• California Assembly member Roger Dickinson, a Democrat, introduced a bill that would add a 5-cent tax to the sale of every bullet. A hearing is set for April 15. Much of the $50 million in estimated revenue would go to restore funding for mental health screening programs in elementary schools, he says.
Proposing a new tax is "a delicate question at any time," he says, but the political risks are "worth paying."
• A committee heard testimony last week on a Nevada bill that would create a $25 tax for gun sales and a 2-cent tax on each round of ammunition. Funds would benefit victims' services and mental health programs.
• Massachusetts state Rep. David Linsky, a Democrat, proposed a 25% sales tax on ammunition and firearms, with the money going to mental health and victims' programs, police training and firearms licensing. "We tax cigarettes, we tax alcohol, we tax other items that have a negative effect on society," he says.
• The Maryland General Assembly passed a bill that includes a fee of up to $25 for handgun licenses. Delegate Jon Cardin, a Democrat, also proposed a 50% tax on ammunition purchases to increase funding for mental health programs and to modernize permitting and licensing procedures.
"This is not taking away people's guns," Cardin says.
_______________________________________________________________________
Senators work on deal expanding background checks
By ALAN FRAM (The Associated Press) — Sunday, April 7th, 2013; 3:27 a.m. EDT
WASHINGTON (AP) — Talks between two influential senators have emerged as the most promising route for a bipartisan breakthrough on expanding federal background checks for gun buyers, a pivotal part of President Barack Obama's plan for combating gun violence.
One possibility being discussed by Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W. Va., and Pat Toomey, R-Pa., would involve expanding background checks to gun show sales and firearms transactions online, Senate aides said. Sales between close relatives and temporary transfers between hunters may be excluded, but an agreement along those lines could give Obama's guns agenda a significant boost and would be a major expansion of the current system, which covers only sales handled by federally licensed gun dealers.
The agreement remains a work in progress and could change, said Senate aides who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe private talks.
But because of their credentials, an accord between the two lawmakers could make it easier for gun control advocates to win crucial support from wavering moderate Democrats and from GOP senators, who have largely opposed much of Obama's push on guns.
Manchin is a moderate and Toomey is a conservative, and both senators have received A ratings from the National Rifle Association, which has opposed the major parts of Obama's plan, including his call for nearly universal background checks.
Senators return Monday from a two-week spring recess, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has been hoping to begin debate on Democrats' gun legislation Tuesday. That could be delayed if Manchin and Toomey seem close to an agreement but need more time to complete one.
Obama planned to speak at the University of Hartford in Connecticut on Monday to continue trying to pressure Congress to move ahead on gun control legislation.
Also high on Congress' agenda is immigration, where a decisive moment is approaching.
Bipartisan groups in the House and Senate are expected to present legislation as early as this week aimed at securing the U.S. border, fixing legal immigration and granting legal status to millions who are in the United States without authorization. That will open months of debate on the politically combustible issue, with votes by the Senate Judiciary Committee expected later this month.
The House returns Tuesday and initially plans to consider a bill preventing the National Labor Relations Board from issuing rules until a dispute over administration appointees is resolved.
Lawmakers will also devote time to the 2014 budget that Obama plans to release Wednesday. It calls for new tax increases, which Republicans oppose, and smaller annual increases in Social Security and other government benefit programs, over the objections of many of the president's fellow Democrats.
Advocates' hopes were high for congressional action on gun restrictions following the December massacre of 20 first-graders and six staffers at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn.
But momentum seems to have dipped in recent weeks and it remains unclear whether the Democratic-run Senate will be able to approve any curbs considered major by gun control groups. An Obama-backed assault weapons ban seems all but dead, and a prohibition against ammunition magazines carrying over 10 rounds, also supported by the president, seems unlikely to survive.
Without support from some Republicans, a significant expansion of background checks won't be possible because there are only 53 Democrats in the Senate plus two Democratic-leaning independents. Conservative GOP senators have promised to use delaying tactics against gun legislation, which would take 60 votes to end.
Federal background checks are currently required only for transactions handled by the roughly 55,000 federally licensed firearms dealers; private sales such as gun-show or online purchases are exempt.
For weeks, Manchin has been part of an effort to craft a background check compromise, along with Sens. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Mark Kirk, R-Ill. Schumer focused his efforts on conservative Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., but those talks sputtered over Schumer's insistence on — and Coburn's opposition to — requiring that records be kept of private gun sales.
"I'm still hopeful that what I call the sweet spot — background checks — can succeed," Schumer said Sunday. "We're working hard there."
Proponents say background checks and records — which are currently retained by gun dealers, not the government — are the best way to ensure that would-be gun buyers' histories are researched. Opponents say the system is a step toward government files on gun owners and say criminals routinely skirt the checks anyway.
Asked about the potential compromise, Manchin spokesman Jonathan Kott said, "My boss continues to talk to all of his colleagues." Toomey spokeswoman E.R. Anderson said she could provide no information.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., urged fellow Republicans to allow debate to go forward without a filibuster, even as he declined to express support for a background check bill.
"The purpose of the United States Senate is to debate and to vote and to let the people know where we stand," McCain said, appearing alongside Schumer on CBS' "Face the Nation."
With or without an agreement, the Senate gun legislation would toughen federal laws against illegal firearms sales, including against straw purchasers, those who buy firearms for criminals or others barred from owning them. The legislation also would provide $40 million a year, a modest increase from current levels of $30 million, for a federal program that helps schools take safety measures such as reinforcing classroom doors.
In addition, the gun bill contains language by Schumer expanding background checks to cover nearly all gun transactions, with narrow exceptions that include sales involving immediate relatives. Even without a bipartisan deal, Schumer is expected to expand the exemptions to more relatives, people with permits to carry concealed weapons and others, in hopes of winning more support.
_______________________________________________________________________
Hypocrisy
Gun Control Advocates Showing How Much They Like Guns
By ALEXANDRA OLSON (The Associated Press) — Monday, April 8th, 2013; 1:46 a.m. EDT
NEW YORK -- Lobbying for gun control in the United States often means proving how much you like firearms.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, whose state recently passed some of the strictest gun control measures in the country, often reminds people he is a hunter. Former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who founded a gun control advocacy group after surviving a gunshot wound to the head, says she and her husband keep two guns in a safe at home. Vice President Joe Biden boasts that he owns two shotguns. And the White House recently released a photo of President Barack Obama skeet shooting at the Camp David presidential retreat, trying to silence skeptics of his claim in an interview that he has actually shot a gun.
The message is obvious: They, too, are a part of America's gun culture. In a country where at least a third of households have firearms, it's hard to impose stricter arms rules without support from gun owners. That means reassuring Americans that nobody is going to take away the guns they have legally acquired.
Gun rights groups scoffed at what they called clumsy and obvious attempts by Biden and Obama to ingratiate themselves with firearm owners even while trying to limit their rights.
"It's transparent, cynical and hollow and gun owners see right through it," said Lawrence Keane, senior vice president of the National Shooting Sports Foundation, an association that represents gun manufacturers.
But gun control proponents have pressed on with such efforts ahead of a crucial Senate vote on legislation backed by the Obama administration in response to the Dec. 14 shooting of 20 children and six educators at a Connecticut school.
A recent $12 million ad campaign, bankrolled by billionaire New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, urged moderate Republican and Democratic senators to support expanding federal background checks for gun sales, a system that currently applies only to federally licensed dealers. Advocates want to include gun show sales.
Far from criticizing guns, the ad shows a scruffy-faced man holding a shotgun in the back of a pickup truck. He argues that background checks don't infringe on the Second Amendment of the Constitution, which guarantees the right of citizens to bear arms and is often cited by gun rights defenders.
"For me, guns are about hunting and protecting my family," the man says, as two children play on tire swings in the background. "I believe in the Second Amendment, and I'll fight to protect it. But with rights come responsibilities. That's why I support comprehensive background checks, so criminals and the dangerously mentally ill can't buy guns."
Broader background checks face an uphill battle in Congress, along with proposals for a ban on military-style assault rifles and limits on ammunition capacity. Many Republicans and some Democrats represent states where citizens have vocally expressed fears that their gun rights will be taken away in the wake of the Connecticut shooting.
Gun sales nationwide surged after the school attack as people rushed to buy weapons they feared would be banned. Some communities have voted to allow teachers to carry firearms in schools, arguing that guns make people safer. A handful of small towns have even issued ordinances requiring their residents arm themselves.
The powerful National Rifle Association, which spent at least $24 million during the last U.S. election cycle, has stoked those fears, suggesting that the White House's real intention to eventually to ban all firearms. "It's about banning your guns ... PERIOD!" NRA leader Wayne LaPierre wrote in January email to the group's 4 million members.
But gun control advocates see evidence that, since the Connecticut shooting, many firearms owners are more open to stricter laws than the NRA contends.
Recent polling shows that more than 80 percent of Americans support extending federal background checks to include gun show sales and private purchases. Colorado, a state with a strong frontier tradition of gun ownership, passed legislation last month that expanded background checks to apply to personal and online sales and limited magazine capacity to 15 bullets. Connecticut followed suit with an even stronger bill to ban more than 100 previously legal weapons. In Maryland, legislators have approved a measure that, among other things, requires people who buy a handgun to submit fingerprints to state police.
Obama and others are touting such efforts as signs that the country can bridge one of its deepest cultural divides: The split between mostly rural Americans who cherish guns for hunting and self-defense and urban citizens who equate them with gang violence, drive-by shootings and young lives lost.
"I'm 100 percent for expanded background checks, because if you have something to hide, we don't want you to have a gun," said Jaci Turner, a gun owner who lives in a suburb of Denver, Colorado. "I don't have anything to hide, so I'll answer all your questions."
Turner, a dog trainer, grew up around guns in Minnesota. Weekends were often spent hunting or on the shooting range with her father. She and her husband, a big animal veterinarian, have shotguns, a rifle, a handgun and are in the process of acquiring a semi-automatic gun. She plans to take her 6-year-old daughter to the shooting range for the first time this year. Like many people from Colorado, Turner considers guns a normal part of enjoying the great outdoors.
"One of the biggest reasons for carrying a handgun is we spend a lot of time in the back country, so it's protection from wild animals," Turner said. "It's a whole lot easier to carry in a backpack than a different type of gun."
But Turner was unfazed when Colorado passed new gun control legislation. She said she doubted hunting groups would follow through on threats to boycott the state.
"I think they'll come here under the radar because if you are a hunter, you are a hunter," she said. "I don't have a huge problem with controlling large high-capacity or even high-caliber firearms because they were made for a reason, and we don't have that reason in our lives. I'm not walking around Afghanistan."
Giffords, the former congresswoman who was left partially blind and struggling to talk in a January 2011 shooting that killed six other people in Arizona, tried to reach people like Turner in a recent ad campaign promoting extended background checks.
"There are solutions we can agree on, even gun owners like us," Giffords said in the commercial.
Biden tried to strike a similar tone in a recent online video as part of a Facebook town hall. Reminiscing about learning firearm safety from his father, a hunter, the vice president said he has told his wife, Jill, to take one of their shotguns and "fire two blasts outside the house" if she ever felt threatened by an intruder. His point was that nobody needs a semi-automatic weapon to protect their home. "Buy a shotgun, buy a shotgun," Biden urged listeners.
But for some gun defenders, Biden only proved that the gap remains wide between his side of the debate and theirs.
Keane, the vice president of the gun association, which is based in the Connecticut town where the school shooting occurred, said many people prefer semi-automatic guns for protection because it gives them a better chance to hit their target.
Turner said she wants to add a semi-automatic to her collection for that very reason.
"Well, good luck, Joe," she said, referring to the vice president. "When someone walks in the house and you're freaked out, you're only going to give her two chances? Good luck."
_______________________________________________________________________
Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘The New York Daily News’ Editorial:
Gun controls now
Congress must stand up to the NRA and keep firearms away from homicidal maniacs
It’s high noon in Washington in the battle for gun control and, playing the role of Gary Cooper, Sen. Chuck Schumer must win the day against all odds.
Congress returns to session Monday to take up legislative proposals that grew out of national revulsion following the Sandy Hook massacre. Conventional wisdom holds that a ban on assault weapons has no chance, and effective, enforceable universal background checks will be defeated as well.
The National Rifle Association and, if you can believe it, even crazier gun crazies appear to be winning the day, regardless of whether 90% of Americans tell pollsters they support universal checks designed to prevent criminals and the mentally ill from buying firearms.
The gun lobby has conjured the fantasy that expanding checks to cover the 40% of weapons sales that now escape them would lead to a national gun registry and, from there, to governmental seizure of weapons. This is propaganda by paranoia.
The proposed legislation includes only common-sense steps, involving virtually no inconvenience, that are designed to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people — like, for example, James Holmes, the madman who shot up a Colorado movie theater, killing 12 and wounding 70.
Holmes acquired his arsenal legally in a gun-friendly state that has led the way for local gun controls, including universal checks and limits on the size of high-capacity ammunition magazines.
Even under the new restrictions, Holmes might well have been able to buy guns because he was not diagnosed as mentally ill until too late. But he dramatically illustrates why America needs a foolproof system for separating those who have been officially classified as mentally ill from weapons.
A month before the massacre, a University of Colorado psychiatrist called Holmes a “danger to the public due to homicidal statements he had made,” according to a search warrant document. Choosing not to hold him involuntarily, the doctor reported her fears to campus police, who revoked his card-key access to school buildings.
And that was it. Holmes was exactly the person who should have been confined and whose record should have been transmitted to the national background check database. More, as soon as the doctor reported his “homicidal” tendency, the law should have required police to seize — yes, seize — all of Holmes’ weapons.
In New York, the gun law forced through by Gov. Cuomo calls for doing just that. In Colorado, Holmes went out the day after the doctor contacted cops and bought a 100-round magazine.
Despite the screamingly obvious need for thorough national background checks, Schumer has been negotiating for weeks with Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn, who says he supports background checks — except he wants a system that would immediately destroy the records.
After a gun sale was consummated, there would be no way to verify whether the buyer had submitted to a background check. So why should buyers and sellers go through the hassle?
Schumer is pushing for a searchable database so authorities can trace a gun found in a crime back to the point of sale, where the background check could be verified. But the gun forces recoil from this basic law enforcement tool without regard to the lives hanging in the balance.
_______________________________________________________________________
Law Enforcement Technology / Reading Your Private Tweets and iMail
DEA memo provokes Apple privacy debate
By Nick Farrell — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘TG Daily.Com’
The US Drug Enforcement Agency has been accused of messing with Apple fanboy's heads by pretending that it cannot read their iMessages.
Last week Cnet got its paws on a "leaked" Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) memo suggesting that messages sent via Apple's own iMessage system were untappable and were "frustrating" law enforcement.
The memo moaned that encryption used in Apple's iMessage chat service had stymied attempts by federal drug enforcement agents to eavesdrop on suspects' conversations.
It seemed that a February 2013 criminal investigation was affected and the DEAwarns that because of the use of encryption, "it is impossible to intercept iMessages between two Apple devices" even with a court order.
This meant that CNet was effectively providing proof that Apple's product was so superior that it had law enforcement unable to match it. The implication is that if you wanted true privacy you should buy an iPhone. CNet has been doing this sort of thing a lot lately. Recently it ran a story celebrating the three year milestone (sic) for the iPad along with links to where you can buy one.
But there were some faulty logic in the memo. It implied that Apple had some brilliant security which even the Feds could not crack and it also implied that Jobs' Mob did not have control over its own network.
It is true that Apple boasts of "end-to-end encryption" but Apple itself holds the key because it means that when you boot up a new iOS device, you automatically get access to your old messages.
This means that Apple is storing those messages in the cloud and can decrypt them if it needs to.
What the email really only suggests that law enforcement can't get those messages by going to the mobile operators. It says nothing about the ability to get those same messages by going to Apple directly. And, in fact, in many ways iMessages may be even more prone to surveillance, since SMS messages are only stored on mobile operators' servers for a brief time, whereas iMessages appear to be stored by Apple indefinitely.
According to Tech Dirt the memo appears to have been leaked to CNet to falsely imply that iMessages are actually impervious to government snooping. But Julian Sanchez at the Cato Institute comes up with two plausible theories.
The first is that this is part of the feds' effort to convince lawmakers to make it mandatory that all communications systems have backdoors for wiretapping and the other is that it's an attempt to convince criminals that iMessages are safe, so they start using them falsely believing their messages are protected.
_______________________________________________________________________
States want license plates 2 B EZ to read
A better flow of numbers and letters, less busy backgrounds and more readable, reflective material are what some states are looking for in revamping plates.
By Emma Beck — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘USA Today’
A growing number of states are working on ways to increase both standard and specialty license plate readability, which state and law enforcement officials say has become an increasing public safety issue.
"If police officers who have training in identifying license plates can't make them out, what are the chances that a citizen who just catches a plate going by and sees the numbers will be able to tell you what it was?" says Sgt. Bill Murphy from the Pima, Ariz., country sheriff department.
Proposed legislation in Arizona seeks to standardize future specialty license plates by minimizing cluttered backgrounds and constricting the organization's logos into a 3-inch square.
Elsewhere:
• Florida's Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (FLHSMV) is working on revising its standard plate design, stating that current embossed numbers and letters make it difficult for law enforcement officers to see them from a distance.
• In Ohio, the problem isn't the background nor the characters — but rather, the plates' material. A bill, signed by Gov. John Kasich, R-Ohio, last Monday permits plates to be made of material other than galvanized steel, which can rust and affect readability.
• Texas updated its state-standard license plates last July. Dubbed "The Texas Classic," the design features larger plate characters and updated grouping. The change allows for a "better flow for people to remember the numbers and letters" in addition to a more legible plate design for "easier plate identification," said Robert Acosta, a customer service representative for the Texas DMV.
Although states follow no nationwide standard for license plate design, Brian Ursino, the director of law enforcement for the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA), says he believes there should be. "States should be free to design their own plates with a mind toward uniformity."
The AAMVA recommends that license plate numbers and letters follow standardized fonts and sizes and that the full state name be clear and listed in the top center of the license plate, according to an AAMVA July 2012 best-practices guide.
. Arizona offers 53 specialty plate designs, a challenge for law enforcement officers and witnesses to crimes to easily identify a plate as one from Arizona, said Aaron Latham, the director of communications for the Arizona state Senate Democratic caucus. About 1.8 million Arizona drivers use specialty license plates; 3.7 million use state standard license plates.
"You get a split second to look at a license plate," he said. "If you're not familiar with the (53) specialty plates in Arizona, then you're not going to know."
Proposed legislation in Arizona seeks to standardize future specialty license plates by minimizing cluttered backgrounds and constricting the organization's logos into a 3-inch square.
The Arizona specialty license plate proposals are based on Maryland specialty plate requirements, Farley said. All Maryland specialty plates, referred to as organizational license plates, feature a plain, white background with the organization's name at the bottom of the plate.
Georgia follows similar protocol, with specialty plate logos positioned to the left of the plate's design and all license plates featuring a header of "Georgia," "Georgia.gov" or "Georgia ... on my mind."
Not all state law enforcement departments find that too many plates to recall pose too much of difficulty to identify.
Harry Irick, police chief in Ware Shoals, S.C., says he has no problem with license plate identification. The state offers about 150 specialty license plates, says Beth Parks, the communications director for the South Carolina DMV.
"The fact the plate's numbers and characters are reflective and light up when the car lights hit them, makes the plate easy to read," he says, adding that he likes that the variety of specialty plates give customers "something to shop for."
_______________________________________________________________________
Homeland Security
Cyber education key to security
By JANET NAPOLITANO — Monday, April 8th, 2013 ‘Politico’
Today, cyberspace is woven into the fabric of our daily lives. According to recent estimates, cyberspace now encompasses more than 2 billion people with at least 12 billion computers and devices, including global positioning systems, mobile phones, satellites, data routers, desktop computers and industrial control systems that run our power plants, water systems and more. It would take only a single infected computer to potentially contaminate or infect thousands or more. Ultimately, our nation’s cybersecurity depends on the people who defend it. The most impressive and sophisticated technology is useful only if it’s operated and maintained by a world-class cybersecurity workforce.
While the vast majority of the nation’s cyber infrastructure is privately owned, the security and economic implications are so profound that their protection is of national importance. To meet constantly evolving challenges, the Department of Homeland Security is growing its world-class cybersecurity team through strong career paths within the department and throughout the federal government. Last October, the Homeland Security Advisory Council Task Force on CyberSkills provided recommendations to help DHS expand the national pipeline of men and women with advanced cybersecurity skills, enable DHS to become a top competitor for cybersecurity talent and enhance the department’s ability to make our nation safer, more secure and more resilient.
DHS is creating and implementing standards of performance through a professional certification system, building a cybersecurity talent pipeline through academic institutions nationwide and with other key partners. For example, students at select community colleges across the country who complete their studies in cybersecurity programs are eligible to apply their skills in a six-month residency at a critical sector organization. DHS has also taken great steps to help our veterans with the support of national, large-scale veteran jobs programs.
DHS is creating a standardized and comprehensive training and development program to grow and retain our existing cybersecurity workforce. We are also establishing a dynamic Cyber Surge Capacity Force composed of certified cybersecurity professionals with critical skills in the private sector, who will be readily available for rapid support and deployment in response to potentially significant cyber events impacting our nation’s critical infrastructure.
We are extending the scope of cyber education beyond the federal workplace through the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education to include the public, as well as students from kindergarten through post-graduate school. We have created a number of competitive scholarship, fellowship and internship programs to attract top talent, including the Secretary’s Honors Program, and we continue to support Centers of Academic Excellence around the country to cultivate a growing number of professionals with expertise in various disciplines, including cybersecurity.
To stay ahead of rapidly evolving threats, we must move aggressively to recruit, educate and train a cyber workforce for the future, with the skills we need to tackle this problem in the years ahead. The Obama administration is committed to engaging with Congress to review how best to hire, train and manage the cybersecurity workforce across the federal government. To that end, we must work together to improve DHS’s ability to hire and retain cybersecurity personnel by updating hiring and pay flexibilities for DHS as well as increasing the federal government’s access to cyber experts by applying existing public-private personnel exchange authorities to civilian agencies.
To address the urgent cybersecurity challenges that our nation faces, we must take steps to address these problems today. Since the inception of our nation, we have always risen to meet new challenges, and right now we need you and every American to stand up and face our next big challenge — cybersecurity.
Janet Napolitano is secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.
_______________________________________________________________________
Mike Bosak
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment