| -Lurid Crime Tales- |
| Netflix Has Nothing to Say After Three Men from ‘Cheer' Arrested for Sex Crimes Against Minors |
| 2021-02-10 |
| [Daily Beast] Netflix has a problem. Last year the streaming service found itself a hit with Cheer, which followed Navarro College’s elite cheer team as they trained for the National Cheerleading Association’s championship competition, which sees hundreds of college teams flocking to Daytona Beach for the annual event. Known nationally as a powerhouse team led by coach Monica Aldama, the cheerleaders attend the small junior college in the sleepy rural town of Corsicana, Texas. The docuseries highlights the athletes’ various heart-touching backstories as they practice day and night, risking breaking limbs as they back-handspring, jump, and perform gravity-defying stunts in order to bring home the coveted championship trophy. It didn’t take long for cheerleader Jerry Harris to emerge as a breakout star. The always positive 21-year-old became beloved for his inspirational mat talks, leading viewers to root throughout the series for him to make it "on the mat" for the big competition. |
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| -Lurid Crime Tales- |
| ‘Manhunt: Deadly Games' Is An Outstanding Series About Richard Jewell And Eric Rudolph |
| 2020-12-18 |
| [Daily Caller] "Manhunt: Deadly Games" is an awesome TV series. The series from Spectrum recently hit Netflix, and I wasted literally no time firing it up. The show revolves around the 1996 bombing at the Olympics in Atlanta, the aftermath with Richard Jewell and the hunt for Eric Rudolph. If you watched the movie about Richard Jewell from Clint Eastwood, then I can promise that you’re going to love "Manhunt: Deadly Games." |
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| Britain | ||||||
| EU orders British press NOT to reveal when terrorists are Muslims | ||||||
| 2016-10-06 | ||||||
 MEDDLING Brussels has said the British press should not report when terrorists are Muslims in a slew of demands to the Government to crack down on the media. A report from the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) found there was an increase in hate speech and racist violence in the UK from 2009 to March 2016. Blaming the press, ECRI Chair Christian Ahlund, said: “It is no coincidence that racist violence is on the rise in the UK at the same time as we see worrying examples of intolerance and hate speech in the newspapers, online and even among politicians.” The report makes a whopping 23 recommendations to Theresa May’s Government for changes to criminal law, the freedom of the press, crime reporting and equality law. And despite the report not analysing coverage of the historic Brexit vote, Mr Ahlund saw fit to comment on the UK's decision to leave the EU. In a sweeping statement, he said: “The Brexit referendum seems to have led to a further rise in ‘anti-foreigner’ sentiment, making it even more important that the British authorities take the steps outlined in our report as a matter of priority.” The report lays into the British press and urges the government to “give more rigorous training” to reporters.
Despite the creation of the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) in 2014 as an independent regulator for newspapers and magazines,
In a statement, ECRI said: “ECRI welcomed, among other things, the entry into force of the Equality Act 2010 and the generally strong legislation against racism and racial discrimination in the country, as well as the government’s new hate crime action plan and substantial efforts to promote LGBT rights in the UK which have led to a significant change in attitudes. “At the same time, the commission noted considerable intolerant political discourse in the UK, particularly focusing on immigration. It said that hate speech continues to be a serious problem in tabloid newspapers, and that online hate speech targeting Muslims in particular has soared since 2013.” | ||||||
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| -Lurid Crime Tales- |
| Okla. Bomber Sues Prison For Constipation |
| 2009-04-30 |
| The Smoking Gun Web site reports on a lawsuit against his jailers filed by Terry Nichols, the domestic terrorist who teamed up with Timothy McVeigh to murder 168 people in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. According to the court documents on the Smoking Gun Web site, Terry Nichols, 54, says the low-fiber prison diet has given him "chronic constipation, bleeding, hemorrhoids." This week, a federal judge rejected Nichols's bid for a preliminary injunction against the Bureau of Prisons. A lawsuit filed last month by Nichols is pending. To support his claim, Nichols solicited testimonials from other high-profile inmates including Eric Rudolph, whose bombs killed victims at abortion clinics and the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Rudolph agrees with Nichols, saying "refined and highly processed" food served to killers like him causes "constipation, gas, and stomach cramps." |
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| Home Front: Politix |
| Abortion clinic bombers not terrorists: Palin |
| 2008-10-24 |
| Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin, who has accused Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama of "palling around with terrorists," has refused to call people who bomb abortion clinics by the same name. Asked by NBC television presenter Brian Williams whether an abortion clinic bomber was a terrorist, Governor Palin heaved a sigh and, at first, circumvented the question. "There's no question that Bill Ayers by his own admittance was one who sought to destroy our US Capitol and our Pentagon. That is a domestic terrorist," Governor Palin said, referring to a 1960s leftist who founded a radical violent gang dubbed the Weathermen and who years later supported Senator Obama's first run for public office in the state of Illinois. "Now, others who would want to engage in harming innocent Americans or facilities that it would be unacceptable to ... I don't know if you're gonna use the word 'terrorist' there," she added. Early this month, after the New York Times ran an article highlighting the ties between Senator Obama and Mr Ayers, Governor Palin told a campaign rally in Colorado that Senator Obama "sees America it seems as being so imperfect that he's palling around with terrorists who would target their own country." Attacks on doctors who practice abortion and on family planning clinics in the United States in the 1980s and 1990s left several people dead and scores wounded. Eric Rudolph, the extreme right winger who planted a bomb at the Atlanta Olympics in 1996, which killed one person, was sentenced three years ago to two life terms in jail for an abortion clinic bombing in Alabama in which a policeman was killed. |
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| Home Front: WoT |
| Terrorist Mastermind Now A Christian? |
| 2007-10-12 |
| Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the first terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, claims he converted from Islam to Christianity, Scott Pelley reports in a story that brings viewers inside the secretive Supermax prison where he is being held. Pelley also reports that some 900 forced feedings were performed on other al Qaeda terrorists who went on repeated hunger strikes to protest conditions at the Colorado top-security federal prison. Pelley's report will be broadcast Sunday, Oct. 14, at 7:30 p.m. ET, 7 p.m. PT. The prison in Florence, Colo., which the government calls ADX-Florence for Administrative Maximum, houses the nation's toughest and most infamous criminals, such as Olympic bomber Eric Rudolph, would-be 9/11 terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui, Oklahoma City bomber Terry Nichols and shoe bomber Richard Reid. 60 Minutes obtained exclusive footage of prisoners inside the facility, where special-case prisoners are allowed only a phone call a month, spend 23 hours a day in their 12-by-7 cells and can get mail only from people approved by the prison. Robert Hood, its warden from 2002 to 2005, says Yousef was a special case. He never left his cell because he did not want to face the indignity of a strip search required for recreation. "He has that Charlie Manson look," Hood says of Yousef. "He has some charisma about him. He's in [prison] uniform, but you know that there's a powerful person you're looking at," Hood says. Told that Yousef has begun leaving his cell and now claims to be a Christian, Hood tells Pelley, "He's playing a game with someone. If he's doing that, he's doing it for the reaction ... He is the real deal." As a Muslim, Yousef prayed almost every hour, Hood says. Other al Qaeda terrorists protested the special conditions with hunger strikes that Hood had to end with force feedings. "I probably .. authorized, conducted 350, maybe 400 involuntary feedings," Hood says. "You could have one person, three meals a day for ... two months." Pelley also speaks with a corrections officer inside ADX-Florence, who tells him what she heard on 9/11 after terrorist prisoners saw the destruction on their televisions. "We had a lot of them jump up and down ... scream and yell and clap and they were very excited," says Barbara Batulis, who heads the prison's staff union. She also characterizes the Muslim extremists as needy. "They want more than what they have coming," she says. "They want extra toilet paper ... writing paper ... extra envelopes and if you can't give them, they want to see a supervisor right then and there." Batulis would rather work among the other prisoners because she is female. "It's very obvious, [Muslim extremists] just look at you with sheer disdain." Hate can turn into threats. "A terrorist inmate threatened to kill my family, because I was doing my job," Batulis tells Pelley. Batulis says the prison needs more officers. "... We are very short staffed. I firmly believe that staff lives are at stake," she says. |
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| Home Front: WoT |
| FBI's PATCON Operation Against White Supremacists |
| 2007-10-11 |
| Undercover FBI agents posing as white supremacists gathered alarming intelligence about the militia movement during the early 1990s, according to documents obtained by INTELWIRE. But FBI headquarters abruptly terminated the undercover operation -- code-named PATCON -- just three months after the disastrous siege at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas. The timing could hardly have been worse; the networks targeted by the investigation were inflamed to violence by Waco. At least one individual targeted in the investigation -- Andreas Strassmeier -- was later linked to Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh. Another target of the investigation was later linked to Eric Rudolph, perpetrator of the 1996 Olympic Park bombing. PATCON was the centerpiece of an extensive investigation of militia and white supremacist groups in Arizona, Alabama, Tennessee and Texas. From 1991 to 1993, at least three undercover agents working under the auspices of the FBI posed as members of a fictional white supremacist group seeking closer ties with established organizations. .. During the late 1980s, the Texas Reserve Militia was formed by some members of the Texas State Guard, a volunteer state military force intended for use when the National Guard is unavailable. The TRM broke away from the state organization when Texas officials determined they were forming an unconstitutional "private army." The group was also known as the Texas Light Infantry, the Second Order and The Order. The latter names were inspired by a 1980s neo-Nazi gang that robbed banks and counterfeited money to fund attacks on the government and target ethnicities. The TRM conducted monthly paramilitary training courses at a camp in the Austin, Texas, area. The camp provided training in firearms, explosive and guerilla warfare for volunteers from Texas and out-of-state, including skinheads from Las Vegas and Memphis. By the end of 1991, the TRM had about 50 members and a much larger number of informal associates, the documents said. In or around July 1990, a member of the Texas Reserve Militia threatened to murder two FBI agents with the Austin field office. In response to the threat, the FBI initiated a domestic terrorism investigation against the TRM. Undercover agents were deployed to infiltrate the group, an operation that would later expand into PATCON. . Undercover agents were dispatched to investigate the group The undercover agents posed as "white supremacists who were willing to commit violence in order to further the white supremacy movement." Informants were also actively recruited to penetrate the TRM's ranks. During the course of the investigation, mulitple informants provided information about the organization to the FBI. . Starting some time in 1990, a parade of informants from within the militia movement began talking to the FBI about planned activities by the TRM and other groups. Over the course of several months, the intelligence became alarming and expanded to include other militia groups around the country. On November 21, an informant told the FBI in Phoenix about a shipment of various explosives, improvised military-style ordinance, detonators and assault rifles (illegally modified to be fully automatic). The informant told FBI agents that the TRM was joining forces with an organization called the Texas Reenactment Group and that the combined organization would train using "old East German police uniforms which are being obtained by [redacted]." The merger was expected to increase membership of the TRM by at least 200 members. Members would be armed with fully automatic M-1 carbines. Andreas Strassmeier, ... the son of a prominent German politician and a veteran of that country's army, moved to the United States from Hamburg in the late 1980s or early 1990s, and established relationships with various racist and anti-government movements around the country. .... Shortly before the Oklahoma City bombing, an informant told the ATF Strassmeier was plotting to blow up U.S. federal buildings. The informant also said Strassmeier had traveled to Oklahoma City prior to the bombing. Right after renting the Ryder truck used in the Oklahoma City bombing, Timothy McVeigh called the Elohim City compound and asked to speak with Strassmeier (US v Nichols). Another informant described at least one additional call. After the bombing, Strassmeier fled the country and returned to Germany. The FBI interrogated Strassmeier by phone in May 1996, but agents did not ask him about his association with the TRM. . In addition to the Strassmeier, several key events and figures encountered in the PATCON investigation overlap with the activities of the Aryan Republican Army, a white supremacist bank robbery gang that has been linked to the Oklahoma City Bombing. Like the Order, the ARA robbed banks with the stated purposes of financing an armed revolution against the U.S. government. In a 2007 affidavit, one member of the gang said he suspected Richard Guthrie and other gang members of taking part in the Oklahoma City bombing. In July 1996, Guthrie appeared to commit suicide in prison, shortly before he was scheduled to testify about the ARA's activities. . |
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| -Obits- |
| Richard Jewell Dead at Age 44 |
| 2007-08-30 |
| Richard Jewell, the former security guard who was erroneously linked to the 1996 Olympic bombing, died Wednesday, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said. Jewell, 44, was found dead in his west Georgia home. "There's no suspicion whatsoever of any type of foul play. He had been at home sick since the end of February with kidney problems," said Meriwether County Coroner Johnny Worley. The GBI planned to do an autopsy Thursday. Jewell was initially hailed as a hero for spotting a suspicious backpack in a park and moving people out of harm's way just before a bomb exploded during a concert at the Atlanta Summer Olympics. The blast killed one and injured 111 others. Three days after the bombing, an unattributed report in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution described him as "the focus" of the investigation. Other media, to varying degrees, also linked Jewell to the investigation. He was never arrested or charged, although he was questioned and was a subject of search warrants. The media circus that followed the FBI investigation obscured the fact that Jewell saved the lives of many members of the technical staff working on live TV coverage of the Olympics. Richard ran all the way up and down the four stories of the tower and evacuated everybody, it must have been between 40 and 50 people. Seconds later the thing exploded, said Bruce Rodgers, president of Tribe Inc and designer of the AT&T Global Village, where the explosion happened. "Had he not gotten those people out, I know that at least 20 people on the first two floors of the tower would be dead. Eighty-eight days after the initial news report, U.S. Attorney Kent Alexander issued a statement saying Jewell "is not a target" of the bombing investigation and that the "unusual and intense publicity" surrounding him was "neither designed nor desired by the FBI, and in fact interfered with the investigation." In 1997, U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno expressed regret over the leak regarding Jewell. "I'm very sorry it happened," she told reporters. "I think we owe him an apology." The Atlanta newspaper never settled a lawsuit Jewell filed against it. The case was still pending as of last year. A lawyer for the newspaper did not immediately return calls seeking comment. Eventually, the bomber turned out to be anti-government extremist Eric Rudolph, who also planted three other bombs in the Atlanta area and in Birmingham, Ala. Those explosives killed a police officer, maimed a nurse and injured several other people. Rudolph was captured after spending five years hiding out in the mountains of western North Carolina. He pleaded guilty to all four bombings last year and is serving life in prison. As recently as last year, Jewell was working as a sheriff's deputy. |
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| Home Front: WoT | |||
| Johnny Taliban to vacation in Colorado | |||
| 2007-04-13 | |||
 FLORENCE, Colo. (AP) -- John Walker Lindh, serving a 20-year sentence after fighting for the Taliban in Afghanistan, has been transferred to Supermax, the federal government's most secure prison, authorities said Thursday.
Lindh was captured in November 2001 by American forces sent to topple the Taliban after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. He was charged with conspiring to kill Americans and support terrorists but pleaded guilty to lesser charges, including carrying explosives for the Taliban government. Lindh has served 4 1/2 years. His attorneys have applied to President Bush to commute his sentence after Australian David Hicks was sentenced to less than a year in prison last month for aiding terrorism.
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| -Lurid Crime Tales- |
| Olympic bomber Rudolph doesn't like Supermax in Florence, CO |
| 2006-12-11 |
 Olympic bomber Eric Rudolph laments in a series of letters to a newspaper that the maximum-security federal prison where he is spending the rest of his life is designed to drive him insane.All together now..."Awwwwwww" Where's my femtoviolin? Rudolph wrote that he spends 23 hours a day in his 7-by-12-foot cell, his only exercise confined to an enclosed area he described as a "large empty swimming pool" divided into "dog-kennel style cages." Yup, that's Supermax. Make the U.S. government your enemy, and the U.S. government might just take you up on your offer. The newspaper reported today that it has corresponded by mail with Rudolph for more than a year, and prison officials have refused the paper's request to interview Rudolph. The Gazette refused Rudolph's request that it publish his writings in their entirety. The newspaper said if it published any articles, it would print portions of the letters as long as they were not hate literature or libelous. What is this where newspapers fall all over themselves to publish the works of murderers? Rudolph, an anti-government extremist, pleaded guilty in April 2005 to setting the bomb that killed one person and wounded more than 100 at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, and three other bombings, including a fatal explosion at a Birmingham clinic. It's good that that fat security guard who lived with his mother got what he deserved...wait, was that fake news? |
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| Britain |
| Islamic terrorism is a contradiction in terms, so it doesn't exist. |
| 2006-12-02 |
 Deborah OrrNext week I'm going to the cinema. Definitely. Without the required escort? Stone her. But this Thursday evening saw me sitting on a panel of five women in Whitechapel, and taking part in a "Dialogue With Islam" about whether the veil is "a mark of separation" or "a statement of identity". That there was a 'debate' indicates that we still have a problem. Quite how these two categories are mutually exclusive, I'm afraid, was not resolved during the debate. Neither was anything else. They're quite the same, actually, and that's the point. The more I try to get to grips with this issue, the more puzzling I find it all. I learned during the course of some full and frank exchanges, though, that the veiling of women has got nothing whatsoever to do with female sexuality, protection from the gaze of strangers, or anything else at all. The reason why Muslim women adopt total face and body shrouding is because Allah tells them to. There is, apparently, no other explanation that is either relevant or necessary, whether you believe in Allah or you don't. There is a difference, however: if you wear a shroud because you believe that Allan demands it, fine and dandy. If you wear a shroud because you're afraid that if you don't, the local hard boyz from the Committee for the Protection of Virtue and Elimination of Vice will beat you half to death, then we have a serious problem. It's hard to be a good, progressive feminist when you're scared of being killed if you violate some arcane rule. Allan's commands aren't the central issue here (for many of us), it's the demands of his more fanatical, male adherents. I learned too, more forcefully than I've heard it expressed before, that the idea that this "dress code" oppresses women is ridiculous. Sure Deb, seems rather silly: dressing women like sacks of potatoes shouldn't be considered oppressive in the least. After all, it's the woman's responsibility to control the desires of the men around her. The reason why there has never been a concerted Muslim feminist movement (I'm told) is that Muslim women have always had all of the equalities that Western women are still struggling with the vile British patriarchy to achieve. Quite where this splendid state of affairs can be seen working in an actual society remains somewhat elusive though. Which is a shame, because I'd be off there like a shot if only I could locate the place. Pay attention, Deb: Saoodi-controlled Arabia. Iran. Mauritania. Great place, that Mauritania. Here though, Muslims are constantly and invariably demonised (the audience started jeering when I questioned this entirely negative view), it's all the Government's fault, everything, and since Islamic terrorism is a contradiction in terms, ... Not a contradiction, but increasingly redundant. ... it doesn't exist and therefore can hardly be cited as an influence, rightly or wrongly, on the current woeful state of misunderstanding and distrust. I actually understand the people who advocate my death or forced conversion to their religion, and I always distrust them. People never go on about Christian terrorists, apparently, which proves something -- That there aren't too many. Remember Eric Rudolph? You know him, the fellow who murdered a couple of abortion doctors. Remember the end to his story? A Department of Justice headed by a Bush appointee and an FBI headed by a Bush appointee prosecuted him in a courtroom headed by a Bush appointee, and he's now incarcerated in a federal prison run by a Bush appointee. And he's about the only one I can think of here in the States. -- although I do vaguely remember the days when you only appeared to get two kinds of terrorist anyway - Catholic and Protestant. You haven't travelled much, else you'd have encountered Coptic, Orthodox and Chaldian terrorists. (In an unfortunate cultural echo, they wore black face coverings that showed only their eyes as well.) It was totally grim, of course, back in the days when any Irish person was viewed as a potential terrorist, and much injustice resulted from such assumptions. Remember those days? Remember how few IRA hard boyz it took to bring an entire population under suspicion? And how the moderate Irish government, and moderate Northern Irish government, and brave moderate Irish men and women, went to great lengths in blood and sacrifice to bring it to an end? We're still waiting for the moderate Muslim community and moderate Muslim governments to do the same. I hate the British government's demands that the Muslim community should take on collective guilt for Islamic terror, ... Wrong. They don't demand guilt. They demand responsibility. The Muslim community has to help police itself, and good, loyal Brits of Muslim faith need to rat out the terrorists and terrorist supporters in their midst. There's a difference. ... and I do consider myself to have a great deal in common with the Muslim people I was discussing these matters with. In that case, you're on my list. I didn't support the attack on Afghanistan. Why the hell not? Did you support the Taliban? Or is it that they were too far away and the evil they were committing, from blowing up Buddhas to executing their women in soccer stadiums to enabling terrorist attacks halfway around the world, was too distant for you to care? Remind me, aren't liberals supposed to care about the oppression of ordinary people? Here was the Taliban lopping heads and beating people for the slightest of infractions. Other than issuing statements, what would you do about it? Poseur. I didn't support the war in Iraq. The best face you can put on that position is that you simply didn't (and don't) give a rat's ass about the ordinary people of Iraq. Screw 'em, you got yours. That they were starved and beaten and used cynically for Saddam's own ends, well, that's their tough luck. If they care enough they can revolt on their own, and if Saddam crushes them too bad. And the sanctions were evil because babies were dying; after all the BBC told you so. The people who were so firm about doing away with (for example) apartheid melted away when confronted with the genuine evil of Saddam. What does that say about your morality? I think the "war on terror" and the "axis of evil" are stupid and divisive pieces of dumb propaganda. Until more of your citizens are blown up in the Tube. Then you might gain an appreciation that terror is real, that law enforcement alone as the single arrow in your quiver is an inadequate response, and that there is indeed collusion of evil people to generate and spread terror. I'm troubled by the social exclusion of many Muslims, just as I am by that of other British minorities. Britain is one of the most inclusive countries in the world today. Go ahead and be troubled by the 'social exclusion' of many Muslims; just be mindful as to why, and the extent to which it's generated by Muslims themselves who consider you to be unclean and an infidel. I agree with many of the criticism that the people in Mile End made of British society. Of course you do. Can't possibly imagine that you or they would have anything good to say about your society. That's part of being a good progressive: all cultures are equal except your own which is inferior. Even we at Rantburg have better things to say about Britain than you do, and you live there. But I'm seen by many of the people I spoke with on Thursday as Islamophobic, just because I have some criticisms of Islam - and indeed of revealed religion generally. You might expect that Muslims who care greatly about their faith will consider atheistic critics of said faith to be evil and unworthy of respect. Christians also tend to get a little riled when confronted by such people, especially when their critics are both strident and stupid. Except a Christian won't behead you. That they seem entirely anti-Western, on the other hand, is it be honoured, respected and genially tolerated, if we are to prove ourselves as liberally democratic as we like to say we are. It's quite a trick - having to accept opposing values in order to be seen to uphold your own. And remember, your own society is e-e-e-evil and inferior. Who says so? You do. Why would you expect your opponents to disagree? Turning up before a bunch of people who have nothing positive to say about Britain or its culture is depressing. For you as a good progressive it should have been exhilerating. I'm all for meeting people half way, and so are many British Muslims. But this audience, at least, appeared to want to hear nothing except a fulsome surrender to the idea that the West is always terrible and Islam is always best. No can do. Why not? You seem most of the way there already. Remember to have yourself fitted for a black burqa -- Seafarious, our own fashion consultant, points out that blue will make your ankles look fat. |
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