Where you can grow medical marijuana in Arizona
Facebook Prototyping Page
Here is my Facebook Proto typing web pageI will used it to make my Facebook images to upload to Facebook email dennis and rain and say now I know why kathy was against your bill to legalize pot and only supported the medical marijuana bill do blog on july NORML & PCC meetings create new site for news articles - well create a model so I can copy this krap there use ayruno for next news email this out if it's good stuff!!!! its from http://www.freetempe.com/blog?page=2 Matt Papke Moving people from A to B in an efficient way is critical to keeping a big city moving, as workers and students are ferried to their stations the economy happens. But what is the price of this economy? According to Maricopa Association of Governments it costs $1.03 per rider per mile to move a passenger along the light rail. The Cost per mile of development is $60MM and the annual maintenance per mile is $1.2MM. he also points out the people republic of tempe is one of the most expensive governments in the valley http://www.freetempe.com/blog?page=5 get NORML articles of incorporation get Phoenix NORML articles of incorporation order shorts at walmat order shorts at Wal-Mart the lady I talked to today said that I could order my size 30 shorts at wal-mart and have them delivered to the store of my choice the details are: Faded Glory Bermuda Shorts size 32 or maybe 30 $8.88 on wal-mart website which is http://www.walmart.com/ go to Clothing, Shoes & Jewelry mens Faded Glory Men's Denim Carpenter Short their price is $11 not the $8.88 I saw in the store Nope this is what I want Faded Glory Men's Relaxed 5 Pocket Short $8.88
Arizona's economy lifted by government spending
This article shows how Arizona has gone socialist. You will have to view the other articles I have posted to see how Arizona has turned into a police state.The following quote is a polite way of saying that 1 out of every 5 dollars spent in Arizona is stolen from a hard working taxpayer by the government and spent by someone who received the stolen loot from the government.
"More than 20 percent of Arizona's personal income — or $1 for every $5 — is tied to transfer payments"The article didn't say this, but 1 out of every 5 people nationwide are on the dole and get food stamps.
"Consider the federal food-stamp program, now known as Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. In December 2007, when the recession technically began, Arizona had 598,000 people receiving aid, according to figures compiled by the Arizona Department of Economic Security. Two years later, enrollment reached 1 million ... Nationally, the program grew to 47 million last year from 26 million in 2007"Source
Arizona's economy lifted by government spending
Ronald J. Hansen, The Republic | azcentral.com 11:37 p.m. MST July 19, 2014
Arizonans — and the companies that do business here — have a complex relationship with government. Its tax obligations, inefficiencies, regulations and occasional incompetence are hard to take for many.
But the money from Washington, D.C., is a powerful force in the state's economy.
Many people rely on it as a sole source of income; many businesses cultivate it to grow their profits.
For decades, Keith and Dorothy Stebbins lived comfortably in California on their incomes. They worked in sales for the oil and hotel industries and invested little.
They retired to Arizona, where they now live off Social Security checks and have health insurance through Medicare. After years of paying into the government programs, nearly all the spending by the Casa Grande couple today is with money from the government.
"When I was working and making it in sales, I spent it all," said Dorothy, 91. She called Social Security a "lifesaver," adding that she probably would not have invested even if she hadn't paid into Social Security.
Denver-based DaVita HealthCare Partners also relies on government money. DaVita operates more than 2,000 kidney-dialysis centers nationwide, including 56 in Arizona. It employs more than 57,000 people nationally.
David Tauchen, a spokesman for the company, described DaVita's relationship with the government and private insurers as a partnership.
"About 90 percent of our patients are on Medicare," Tauchen said.
More than 20 percent of Arizona's personal income — or $1 for every $5 — is tied to transfer payments, the term used to refer to income from sources such as Social Security, veterans pensions and insurance, workers' compensation, unemployment aid, welfare and other such programs.
And only half of Arizonans' income comes from wages, down from 56 percent in 2000.
Between money returned to citizens, such as Social Security, contracts with federal agencies such as the Pentagon and Medicare, dollars paid to businesses on a citizen's behalf and student loans, government money spills into the bank accounts of nearly every family and the privately owned businesses that serve them.
Economists say the state takes in significantly more from Washington than it sends in, making the state a net recipient of government spending.
The money moves from the taxpayers who earn it, to the government that redistributes it, to people and businesses who, in turn, generate even more taxable earnings. It is an endless loop, simple in concept, made complex by its size and offerings and often freighted with political implications.
Whether government spending is wanted or welcome, it is here and it is sometimes central to a private business.
"You've got an Arizona that quite often speaks loudly and critically on the amount of federal spending that takes place," said Dennis Hoffman, director of the L. William Seidman Research Institute at the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University. "Those dollars may start out as federal dollars, but they really go directly into the private Arizona economy.
"We are quite reliant on the federal government. We send somewhere in the vicinity of $40 billion in tax dollars to Washington, and we get somewhere in the neighborhood of $65 billion back."
In 2013, researchers at George Mason University estimated that 4.8 percent of Arizona's private-sector jobs were financed in 2012 by federal contracts.
By this measure, Arizona ranked eighth- most-reliant on government contracting in the nation. Virginia topped the list with 10.7 percent. Oregon's private-sector employers owed the least to taxpayer funds, with 0.7 percent.
The report also found that Arizona's "real" private sector — the jobs that weren't supported by government contracting — suffered profoundly from 2007 to 2012. Arizona lost 9.7 percent of its non-government-supported private jobs from 2007 to 2012. Only Nevada lost a higher share.
"One of the things that isn't fully realized by folks is that the government, through contracts, supports quite a few jobs," said Keith Hall, a senior research fellow who helped write the report. "Contract spending didn't really decline during the recession."
Hall said government-supported jobs are not necessarily bad.
"It's not clear that it crowds out any (private sector) jobs," he said, adding that the full impact of government on the private sector is likely larger than his own calculations.
Even so, Hall believes that states such as Arizona have to prepare for a day when government spending must decline to manage the nation's growing debt "and pivot a little bit to their private sector."
Arizona has relied more on federal funding for its state government revenue than nearly all states since 2008, according to an analysis by the Pew Charitable Trusts. In 2012, for example, 38 percent of Arizona's state budget came from Washington, eighth-most in the nation, Pew found.
The U.S. government footprint here is large, and, in some ways, it has grown. As a result of the Great Recession and an aging population, a higher percentage of people are increasingly spending money taken in from government sources.
Paying people
Early in 2013, when tax refunds across the country were delayed in the aftermath of the "fiscal cliff" showdown in Washington, taxpayers weren't the only ones kept waiting.
So was Walmart.
In an e-mail to company executives obtained by Bloomberg, a vice president at the retail giant called its sales midway through that February "a total disaster."
Not surprisingly, said Hoffman, of the Carey School of Business, sales recovered as taxpayers got their money.
Social Security retirement checks and disability checks often are spent quickly and provide a monthly injection for the rest of the economy.
As recently as mid-2007, about 15 percent of personal income in Arizona came from transfers, according to data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
That peaked at 22 percent in 2010. By comparison, nationally, transfers accounted for 14 percent of income in 2007. It peaked at 18.5 percent in 2010 and now stands at about 17 percent.
As Arizona income from wages fell, benefits from employers and investment income also posted small declines as a share of personal income, too.
This change in the source of income isn't a mystery.
The Great Recession plunged many into the social safety net at the same time that Baby Boomers began retiring. The result is a sizable surge in reliance on government funds to individuals.
"After 2007, there was a steep increase in transfer payments because people started drawing on Social Security because they didn't have incomes or jobs," said Aruna Murthy, director of economic analysis for the Arizona Office of Employment and Population Statistics. "People started drawing on Social Security to live on."
Consider the federal food-stamp program, now known as Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. In December 2007, when the recession technically began, Arizona had 598,000 people receiving aid, according to figures compiled by the Arizona Department of Economic Security. Two years later, enrollment reached 1 million, a level that has scarcely declined in the years since. About half of the recipients are children. [No, I don't get food stamps!!! I did just after I got out of high school in my 1st semester at ASU]
Nationally, the program grew to 47 million last year from 26 million in 2007.
Similarly, Social Security has taken on more recipients, especially in Arizona.
In December 2007, Arizona had 960,000 Social Security recipients. By December 2013, that had grown to 1.2 million recipients, a 23 percent increase. By comparison, nationally, the program grew 16 percent over the same span.
This is partly because Arizona, with its reputation for affordable living and warmer winters, has traditionally been a magnet for retirees like Keith and Dorothy Stebbens. These extra retirees bring an outsize portion of extra government money into the state's economy, experts say.
At the same time, Supplemental Security Income, a federal cash-assistance program generally for those with low incomes or disabilities, also has risen.
In Arizona, the number of SSI recipients jumped to 118,000 in 2013 from 101,000 in 2007. The 17 percent growth in Arizona is faster than the 14 percent growth as a nation.
The money washes through the economy, flowing to Walmart and other grocers and retailers, to power companies, to gasoline stations, and to restaurants and small businesses throughout the state.
Ripple effects
Food City, like other grocers, displays placards telling customers that payments from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, or WIC, are welcome.
Rob Johnson, a spokesman for the parent Bashas' stores, said the business it helps bring is worthwhile, although he didn't specify how integral the federally funded food programs can be to a store's revenue.
"We're privileged to accept both WIC and SNAP payments, as they're a way for us to extend service to a group of customers we might otherwise not have had the opportunity to serve," Johnson said in a statement. "Additionally, when both the merchant and the client use the programs correctly, they're a very secure form of payment."
Others benefit from similar aid indirectly.
Orlina Wright makes $14.42 an hour as a fundraiser but finds it hard to pay her $800 monthly rent and support her six children.
"The only place you can cut back is your food," she said during a recent visit to the United Food Bank, the Mesa-based non-profit.
From 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Fridays, people can get a box of food at United for $17. People line up early. It's popular with seniors and people with disabilities because it helps them stretch their budgets. They do pay something, but the program is government-subsidized. [I think charity should be something that comes from a persons heart. Not where the government points a gun at you and steals your money to give to some elected officials charity. Sadly many private charities are getting government welfare which they give away as charity]
The food bank reported $1 million in government grants last year, about half of it from Washington, said Ginny Hildebrand, interim CEO of the food bank.
About a quarter of the food it receives also comes from federal programs, she said, adding that it helps needy residents while providing an outlet for growers.
"It's critically important," Hildebrand said of the federal assistance her organization receives. "Without it, we would be quite hampered."
Real ID Act to begin to affect Arizonans
Aubree Abril, azcentral.com 11:19 p.m. MST July 19, 2014
Arizona lawmakers told the federal government in 2008 that the state would not cooperate in the Real ID Act, a post-9/11 law meant to make it harder for terrorists to obtain fake IDs.
The first fallout from the decision could begin to be felt in Arizona on Monday.
Residents of states that have not complied with the Real ID Act — Arizona is one of 11 such states — will not be able to use their driver's licenses to get into restricted areas of federal facilities and nuclear power plants.
In January, the list of areas requiring a second form of identification, like a passport, will expand to include all federal facilities that require identification. Ultimately, the restriction could apply to people trying to board a plane, although that will not come until at least 2016, and only after a Department of Homeland Security evaluation.
It might be time for the state to revisit the Real ID issue before then, said Rep. Debbie McCune Davis, D-Glendale.
"It becomes a real problem when we start talking about travel and air travel, because you're going to need to have a valid ID," she said. "That's going to put a burden on the average citizen to have a passport in addition to a state-issued ID in order to meet these requirements."
None of that was on the minds of lawmakers in 2008 when they approved House Bill 2677, which then-Gov. Janet Napolitano signed and which prohibits the state from becoming Real ID-compliant.
U.S. Rep. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Phoenix, was a member of the Arizona House of Representatives when she sponsored the bill along with former Rep. Russell Pearce, R-Mesa, and others on both sides of the aisle. The Arizona Republic quoted Sinema at the time saying she had privacy concerns about Real ID and its supporting databases. [Remember U.S. Rep. Kyrsten Sinema tried to slap that 300 percent, $900 and ounce tax on medical marijuana. U.S. Rep. Kyrsten Sinema is almost always backed by the police unions when she runs for re-election. Remember even thought U.S. Rep. Kyrsten Sinema gives a good talk about how she supports the "little people", when she votes, she votes to support the police state and military industrial complex.]
"When you give government too much access to a person's private information, you open up the potential for abuse, and we have seen that abuse in the past," Sinema said then. "Real ID takes away a person's inherent right to privacy."
Requests for comment from Gov. Jan Brewer's office were not immediately returned.
When state bureaucrats were asked whether they were rethinking compliance with Real ID, they pointed to the state law that says flatly they cannot.
"This state shall not participate in the implementation of the Real ID Act of 2005," says the law, which was forwarded by Arizona Department of Transportation spokesman Harold Sanders. "The department shall not implement the Real ID Act of 2005 and shall report to the governor and the legislature any attempt by agencies or agents of the United States Department of Homeland Security to secure the implementation of the Real ID Act of 2005."
The act established standards for producing and issuing state driver's licenses and identification cards, according to a Department of Homeland Security website. Standards included elements already on licenses — full name, gender, date of birth, a photo — as well as security features meant to deter tampering, a check against Social Security records and a database of all of the license information that could be accessed by any state, among other requirements.
It also authorized grants to help states implement the standards and prohibited federal agencies from accepting identification from states unless they met the standards.
Late last year, the Department of Homeland Security announced the phased enforcement program for Real ID. The first phase started April 21 and affected anyone trying to get access to restricted areas of the Department of Homeland Security's headquarters in Washington. The second phase starts Monday, and the third starts Jan. 19.
Homeland Security said 39 states and four territories are either in compliance with the law or have asked for an extension — even some states that have laws against compliance, as Arizona does — that will let residents of their states use their driver's license alone for access.
Residents of 11 states and American Samoa that have not complied will have to provide some additional ID, such as a passport or an "enhanced" driver's license in those states that allow residents to apply for them.
McCune Davis, who voted against HB 2677, said that there were concerns about the cost of the program but that it "didn't make sense to put a strict prohibition in place."
"My hope was that there would be some negotiation between the state and federal government about offsetting costs so that the state could comply," she said.
Putting the 'real' in Real ID
The Department of Homeland Security's schedule for phasing in enforcement of the Real ID law, when driver's licenses from Real ID-compliant states – Arizona does not comply – would be needed to access these areas:
• Restricted areas of Department of Homeland Security headquarters: Effective April 21, 2014
• Restricted areas at any federal facilities and nuclear power plants: Effective July 21, 2014
• Areas in federal facilities available to the public with identification: Effective Jan. 19, 2015
• Access to commercial flights: No sooner than 2016, and only after review and evaluation of the program
Health care
Beyond the money or debit cards handled by consumers, funds often pass from the government to the private sector on behalf of those consumers. Medicare and Medicaid payments, for example, mostly go to private health-care providers.
Tauchen, of DaVita HealthCare Partners, described DaVita's relationship with the government and private insurers as a partnership, although it is a strained one at the moment.
The government's desire to hold down health-care costs competes with the private sector's ability to provide services at a rate that covers their expenses and leaves room for profit. [That's rubbish. One of the reasons for high medical costs today is because of the governments involvement in medical care. Much which is government welfare programs to hospitals and doctors]
"About 90 percent of our patients are on Medicare," Tauchen said. Even so, the reimbursement rates set by Medicare are overly low and are set to continue falling, as they have in recent years, he said.
"We operate 200 clinics nationally that are operated at a complete loss," Tauchen said. "We understand the reality of Medicare. It's something we want Washington to know, that these (reimbursement) cuts have an impact on care."
In DaVita's latest annual report for investors, it implied that the government funding streams essentially cover costs for dialysis services when it said, "Payments we receive from commercial payors generate nearly all of our profits."
In 2012, doctors, nurse practitioners, labs and others in Arizona collected nearly $1.6 billion from Medicare, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. This helps support an industry that employs 320,000 in Arizona.
Government aid
Other industries have grown to depend on government aid.
Private-sector education has mushroomed across the country, offering students coursework ranging from business studies to automotive repairs to the culinary arts. The private-education industry employs about 60,000 people in Arizona, according to the Office of Employment and Population Statistics.
One thing that ties these private schools together is the heavy reliance on government student aid for their revenue.
The Arizona-based University of Phoenix is the most visible example. In 2012, it received more than $4 billion nationwide in federal student aid, and that covered 86 percent of the tuition paid by its students during the corresponding fiscal year, according to figures tracked by the U.S. Department of Education. It was easily the nation's largest private recipient of such funds.
Grand Canyon University, a private Christian school also based in Phoenix, took in nearly $600 million. That covered 80 percent of its student-education costs, records show. Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Scottsdale collected $27 million from the public, or 79 percent of tuition.
Even those who took in relatively little federal money depended heavily on it. The American Institute of Interior Design in Fountain Hills received just $125,000 in 2012, but it was 73 percent of costs, records show.
In all, there were 56 such Arizona-based private educators taking in more than $5 billion from taxpayers. Nearly all of them reported it was the majority of their tuition revenue.
The for-profit schools provide jobs to those who work for them and in 2012 trained 132,000 people in Arizona with technical and midlevel skills, according to the Association of Private Sector Colleges and Universities. This generated more than $400 million in local, state and federal tax revenue that year, the advocacy group estimates.
Uncle Sam's jobs
And there is direct governmental contracting.
Companies such as Raytheon, Honeywell and General Dynamics are in line to split $3 billion from the government for Arizona contracts this fiscal year, according to the Office of Management and Budget's government-spending website. [OK, I am guilty of indirectly receiving some of this money. I worked at Motorola which is now General Dynamics helping the government make stuff to kill people in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. I also did a lot of work at Honeywell and Sperry Flight Systems, but most of that work was for flight computers used by commercial aircraft.]
One painful reminder of the effects of government spending is in Goodyear, which is set to lose 600 jobs with the scheduled closure next year of a Lockheed Martin plant due to cutbacks by the Pentagon.
Murthy said the government contracts also ripple through subcontractors, whose businesses are tied to those dealing directly with the government.
Arizona's close ties to government spending may grate on some members of the public, but Hoffman doesn't expect it to change anytime soon.
"Is it a bad thing?" he said. "I guess I'd like to know what the alternative is."
In context
Arizonans have a complex relationship with government. Its tax obligations, inefficiencies, regulations and occasional incompetence are hard to take for many. But the money from Washington, D.C., is a powerful force in the state's economy.
Republic reporter Laurie Merrill contributed to this article.
php mike_new_article('No execution unless Arizona reveals drug source'); ?>
Court: No execution unless Arizona reveals drug source
Thank God for the FDA, you can only be murdered by a state government with FDA approved drugs!!!!!
Damn, I am so happy that the FDA and Federal government is protecting my health by allowing state governments to only execute people with FDA approved drugs.
Damn, it's great to live in the Amerikan Police State.
Somebody, please tell Mike Renzulli, I am just joking.
Court: No execution unless Arizona reveals drug source
Michael Kiefer, The Republic | azcentral.com 1:46 a.m. MST July 20, 2014
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Saturday that Arizona must divulge information about the drugs and executioners it will use to put a man to death Wednesday or the execution will not go forward.
Joseph Wood, who killed his estranged girlfriend, Debra Dietz, and her father, Eugene Dietz, in Tucson in 1989, is scheduled to die July 23.
But his attorneys at the Federal Defender's Office in Phoenix filed suit claiming he had a First Amendment right to know who supplied the drugs that will be used to kill him and the qualifications of the executioners who will carry it out.
Two of the judges in a panel of three sided with Wood; the third dissented.
At issue is a new drug combination that Arizona has turned to because it cannot obtain the drugs it normally uses for executions. That combination, and one of the drugs in particular, a Valium relative called Midazolam, has caused apparent "flawed executions," as the court called them, in Ohio and Oklahoma.
The state argued that the information is protected by state law shielding the identity of executioners, and that there is no mandate to turn over all information held by the government.
A judge in the U.S. District Court in Phoenix agreed, prompting Wood's attorneys to take the case to 9th Circuit. It was argued in San Francisco on Friday, and the 9th Circuit issued its opinion late Saturday afternoon.
The court said "the State's argument ignores the ongoing and intensifying debate over lethal injection in this country, and the importance of providing specific and detailed information about how safely and reliably the death penalty is administered."
The opinion mentioned problems over the past several years in obtaining lethal injection drugs. In 2010, The Arizona Republic reported that Arizona had sidestepped federal laws to obtain lethal injection drugs from overseas.
The U.S. District and Appeals courts in Washington, D.C., ruled that the laws had been violated, but Arizona officials have steadfastly denied that the state violated them, placing responsibility on the federal agencies regulating the drugs.
The 9th Circuit took note.
"We, and the public, cannot meaningfully evaluate execution protocol cloaked in secrecy," the majority wrote. "It is in the public's interest that Wood's injunction be granted."
The Arizona Attorney General's Office, which represents the Department of Corrections in the matter, told The Republic it will ask the court to reconsider the decision en banc, meaning that it wants a larger panel of judges toevaluate the question.
Wood's attorney, Dale Baich of the Federal Public Defender's Office, said, "The court correctly recognized the importance of the information Mr. Wood seeks. There is a continuing and intensifying debate over lethal injection in the country, and the court said it's important that specific and detailed information be provided so the public can know about how safely and reliably the death penalty is administered."
In its arguments, the state noted that public attention to the sources of the lethal injection drugs has already led to drug manufacturers refusing to sell to prisons for executions.
Judge Jay Bybee agreed in his dissent, saying, "the disclosure of certain kinds of information also hobbles the state's ability to carry out its legitimate functions. When disclosure inhibits the effectiveness of the process at issue without producing substantial benefits, then public access to the information does not "play a significant positive role in the functioning of the particular process in question."
But the majority issued a preliminary injunction that can be lifted by Wednesday if the state turns over the information. If not, the warrant for Wood's execution will expire by Thursday morning.
"We will be asking the full court to consider this opinion," said Assistant Arizona Attorney General Jeffrey Zick. "Judge Bybee's dissent correctly points out that there is no First Amendment violation here."
If the court refuses to do so, the state can appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, and whether Wood is executed Wednesday could go down to the last minute.
Arizona among worst in U.S. for alcohol-related deaths
Miranda Rivers, Cronkite News Service 10:41 p.m. MST July 19, 2014
Arizona was tied for the fourth-highest rate of alcohol-related deaths among its working-age population from 2006 to 2010, according to a recent Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study.
The report said 13.4 percent of deaths of working-age Arizona residents were attributable to alcohol for that period, up slightly from 13.1 percent during the prior five years.
The 2006-10 rate for the state was well above the national average of 9.8 percent for the period, and tied with Wyoming for fourth-worst, behind New Mexico, Alaska and Colorado.
The same CDC study said Arizona ranked fifth in the nation for the rate of alcohol-related deaths per 100,000 people in the overall population, when the population is adjusted to parallel the nation's age.
Alaska, Montana, New Mexico and Wyoming had higher overall rates.
The study, published last month, looked at 54 alcohol-attributed causes of death, including liver disease, falls, accidents and suicide.
Mandy Stahre, a co-author of the report, cited several possible reasons that one state might perform worse than another. She cited poverty, alcohol-enforcement policies and religious views toward alcohol.
Stahre, an epidemiologist for the Washington State Department of Health, also said there is a "regionality" to the findings that includes the fact that many troubled states are largely rural.
"When dealing with a state like Arizona or New Mexico, you have some areas that are just very rural," Stahre said. "Access to care can be a huge issue."
Not everyone has a trauma center or hospital nearby to go to after a vehicle crash or serious accident, she said.
But Deni Carise, who has worked in substance-abuse treatment for more than 25 years, said there are no easy answers to why alcohol-related deaths are a problem in Arizona.
Carise is chief clinic adviser for Sierra Tucson, a treatment facility for addiction. She speculated that one possible reason for high numbers of alcohol-related deaths — in Arizona and in other states — is the fact that alcoholics and their families have no voice in their communities.
"When your family member is an addict or an alcoholic, it's shameful to admit that," Carise said.
And for people in recovery, she said, being open about their struggles with addiction can cost them their jobs, lessen their likelihood of getting a job and affect their ability to get life insurance.
While there is no one cause, Carise said, there are "a hundred ways" alcoholism can affect a community, including draining health-care resources, overlaps of alcohol addiction and homelessness and children who are more likely to end up in foster care.
Reducing the number of alcohol-related deaths and getting help for people with substance-abuse problems is something everyone should care about, she said, because "it affects them."
"When we let people get into an addiction and continue an addiction in their alcoholism, the community loses that way," Carise said.
The Arizona Department of Health Services is working to prevent alcoholism before it starts, said the department's deputy director for behavioral health, Cory Nelson, by focusing efforts on the state's youth.
Nelson said the goal is to prevent risks that could lead to excessive drinking and alcohol-related deaths down the road.
"The youth are one of our great targets because of the significant long-term impacts you can have," Nelson said, "whereas you have a little less time to work with the adult population."
He said the number of alcohol-attributable deaths could be reduced if they were addressed as a public-health issue like other chronic illnesses, such as diabetes and heart disease.
For those ailments, he said, there is "anywhere between a 70 percent to an 85 percent treatment or screening rate."
But when you look at substance-abuse disorders, "you're looking at about an 18 to 20 percent screening rate," Nelson said.
Despite the problems, Carise said she holds out hope for the future.
"There is more medication being developed, more types of treatments being delivered and more treatment programs opening," said Carise, who also thinks expanded services could come under the Affordable Care Act.
The new benefits will provide "more options for people that are still suffering," she said.
Police shoot man at north Tempe motel
Sophia Kunthara and Katie Bieri, The Republic | azcentral.com 10:37 p.m. MST July 18, 2014
Tempe police shot a man at a motel near the Scottsdale border on Friday evening, an official said.
The condition of the man, who police said was in his 20s, was not immediately available.
Lt. Scott Smith, a Tempe police spokesman, said the man had been involved in an altercation with a woman on Thursday night at a Motel 6 near Scottsdale and McKellips roads but left the area before officers arrived.
Officers returned to the motel at about 5 p.m. Friday upon learning the man was in the lobby, Smith said.
Police believed the man had a firearm and felt there was a threat, and shots were fired, Smith said.
Smith said there is no danger to the community and everyone involved in the incident is accounted for.
Road closures remained in place at Weber Drive and Scottsdale Road as of 8:30 p.m.
Republican wants tax money for his businesses, not others'
Rebekah L. Sanders, The Republic | azcentral.com 10:04 p.m. MST July 19, 2014
One of the wealthiest candidates for Congress in Arizona supports federal subsidies for the industries in which he owns businesses, but he doesn't want taxpayer money to help industries he has no stake in.
Republican Gary Kiehne, a political newcomer and cowboy businessman, has interests across at least three states in ranching, oil drilling and hotels. He reports assets of as much as $13.9 million in his personal financial disclosures.
In a meeting last week with The Arizona Republic editorial board, Kiehne, who is running in the 1st Congressional District, said he would eliminate federal subsidies for two programs: exports and renewable energy.
"The sooner you get the federal government out of involvement in every sector throughout our country, the better off you'll be — except for defending our national borders," he said.
Kiehne explained he opposes renewable-energy incentives because the United States has enough oil, gas and coal reserves.
"You need to let supply and demand take place," he said.
Kiehne differed when asked about programs that aid his own businesses.
He said he supports Small Business Administration loans.
"The only financing available today for hotels is SBA," said Kiehne, who owns at least three hotels.
He also supports Department of Agriculture subsidies. The funds have been crucial to his cattle ranch's survival during drought, Kiehne said.
From 1995 to 2012, Emil Kiehne & Sons Inc., of which Kiehne is president, received more than $1 million in disaster and livestock subsidies, according to data from the USDA collected by Environmental Working Group, a Washington-based environmental advocacy organization. Kiehne did not dispute the numbers.
"The only way you can maintain a cow herd through these droughts ... is through those kind of programs," Kiehne said, unless "you want your steaks to totally disappear off your plate (and) put your cattle people out of business."
Asked later for additional comment, he sent a written statement.
"Any characterization that my support or opposition to government spending has anything to do with my business interests is simply untrue," Kiehne said. "I support guaranteeing small business loans because the small businesses that play a vital role in this district cannot get the capital they need otherwise. The same goes for disaster relief for farmers and ranchers because this program plays a vital role in protecting our food supply."
Kiehne is in a three-way GOP primary for the rural 1st District, which stretches from the Grand Canyon to suburbs of Tucson. The nominee in the Aug. 26 election will face U.S. Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, D-Ariz., in the fall.
GOP opponent Adam Kwasman, a freshman state lawmaker, said he opposes all of the federal incentive programs.
Republican Andy Tobin, a senior state lawmaker, said he supports export, renewable and small-business subsidies. He owns a small insurance business.
After The Republic pointed out Kiehne supported programs that benefited his interests, Tobin needled his opponent.
"I support incentives that help Gary's business," Tobin said.
AZ Talk: Should officials keep fighting legalized pot?
The Republic | azcentral.com 1:36 p.m. MST July 19, 2014
AZ Talk: A cross-section of Arizonans weigh in on legalizing marijuana.
AZ Talk brings you a cross-section of opinion from your fellow Arizonans, young and old, male and female, working class and white collar.
LAST WEEK: Time to deport migrant kids?
TODAY'S QUESTION: Do you agree with Arizona law-enforcement officials who oppose legalizing marijuana?
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Sue Raatjes
YES. Legalizing recreational marijuana is a recipe for disaster. For a long time, marijuana has been labeled a gateway drug that leads to more serious substance-abuse issues. In my volunteer work as a member of a Foster Care Review Board, I see how drug abuse destroys families and victimizes children. Approximately 85 percent of the children in foster care are removed from their families because of parental drug and alcohol dependency. We don't need more addicted parents.
— Sue Raatjes, writer and retired high-school teacher, Phoenix
[What did you expect from a life time government bureaucrat who had been paid to brainwash children in the government schools, or public schools as most people call them, that marijuana is bad, bad, bad.]
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Greg Paske
ABSOLUTELY NOT. Isn't it time to declare the "war on drugs" a failure? We need to rethink our entire approach to drug-law enforcement. A good place to start is marijuana, which never should have been grouped together with heroin, meth and other hard drugs. Even before the recent events in Colorado and Washington, there were decades of evidence in the Netherlands that marijuana legalization does not lead to the decline of Western civilization. With reasonable and strict state regulation, marijuana sales are providing the public schools in Colorado an urgently needed source of tax revenue. Arizona's schools have an even greater need.
— Greg Paske, substitute teacher, Scottsdale
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Christine Schild
NO. The potential amount of taxes the legalization of marijuana would add to Arizona's coffers is staggering. According to an article in Forbes magazine, Colorado took in over $2 million in sales taxes from recreational pot in one month and is on trend to collect an additional $40 million by year's end. The Arizona Supreme Court just handed the state a $317 million bill related to school funding. Where is the state going to get the money? The answer seems obvious.
— Christine Schild, retired attorney, Scottsdale
[Sadly this woman seems to think that marijuana users should be shaken down to pay all of the governments bills. Why should some government bureaucrat get a couple of bucks every time you smoke a joint????]
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Tom Klabunde
NO. Anyone who wants marijuana for recreational use can currently obtain it with minimal effort anyway. The so-called "War on Drugs" is a massive failure. Legalizing marijuana would take the money out of the business that currently feeds the smuggling cartels and reduce the associated violence. It would be a source of revenue to the state, as the experience in Colorado is showing, and perhaps fund programs for people who have issues with marijuana usage, much like those for gambling and alcohol use.
— Tom Klabunde, retired forester, Tempe
West Valley police get new DUI enforcement tools
Matthew Casey, The Republic | azcentral.com 8:25 p.m. MST July 19, 2014
Jeff Gray never had the chance to know his father.
That's because the Litchfield Park resident was only 8 months old when a drunken driver plowed into Gary Gray's Harley-Davidson motorcycle near Seventh and Grant streets in downtown Phoenix.
Now 36, married with three children, everything Jeff Gray knows about his father, who was a welder living in Yuma, comes from old pictures and stories from his relatives.
"I always hear from my family that whenever they see me, it's like looking in the mirror at him," he said. "Even my voice, the way I walk — I've always wanted to actually see that."
Gary Gray died in 1979, a time when the legal drinking age in Arizona was 19 and before the dangers and consequences of driving under the influence became part of the national consciousness. Jeff Gray doesn't know what the punishment was for the driver, but he has been told it was light.
Today, Arizona prides itself on having some of the strictest DUI laws in the country. A standard penalty includes 10 days in jail, a $1,250 fine and ignition-lock devices mandated on vehicles, among other punishments. [I think the $1,250 fine is wrong. I think the current law sets a minimum fine of around $2,000 for simple DUI.]
Authorities are enforcing those laws by combining resources, including the regional West Valley DUI Task Force, which was created in the mid-1990s and is financed through grants from the Governor's Office of Highway Safety.
Buckeye and Peoria recently used more than $131,000 in grants to buy and equip a processing van and an enforcement vehicle. Those were part of a statewide crackdown on Fourth of July weekend that resulted in a 27 percent increase in DUI arrests from 2013.
New computers allow instant processing in mobile DUI enforcement vans, which save time and get officers back on the road more quickly. [Allowing them to raise more $$$ REVENUE $$$ for their government masters]
"That's resources that you wouldn't normally have," Amanda Jacinto, a spokeswoman for the Peoria Police Department, said. "It's a vast improvement as far as getting as many impaired drivers as you can off the road and making sure more people get home safely." [And most importantly raising lots of cash for the govenrment. Cash that is used to pay these DUI cops to shake down people for money]
At least 60 officers from West Valley agencies participated in the Fourth of July weekend task force, said Alberto Gutier, director of the Governor's Office of Highway Safety. About 7 percent of the 534 DUI arrests made statewide over the holiday weekend were made by West Valley officers, including the Department of Public Safety's Metro West office.
"We all work together," Gutier said, adding that Arizona is "recognized nationally as the best of the best (for DUI enforcement)."
Just the presence of the task force might influence people to make responsible decisions about drinking and driving, Jacinto said.
"Hopefully, when people see officers out there and there is a DUI task force, they think twice about how they're getting home," she said.
But if they don't, West Valley agencies have tools and equipment to identify, arrest and enter them into the system.
Buckeye Police Department debuted its DUI processing van in May, which allows officers to do breathalyzer tests, draw blood, take fingerprint scans and apply for search warrants in one location, said police spokesman Sgt. Jason Weeks.
"It allows us to process DUI offenders faster and more efficiently," he said.
Peoria has been able to purchase and equip two DUI enforcement vehicles using $86,000 in grants from the highway-safety office, Jacinto said. The money has also been used to pay salaries of officers participating in task-force operations.
Avondale and Surprise have used about $18,000 in grant money to buy traffic-monitoring equipment, such as a speed trailer, bicycles and pedestrian-safety enhancements.
Glendale and Goodyear police departments have used the grants to bolster their DUI enforcement efforts.
Glendale purchased its DUI processing vehicle in 2005 using grant funds, O'Neill said. The grants have also funded new breath-testing devices, educational materials and programs, including "Know Your Limits" in which officers provide pamphlets and breath-based alcohol screenings to people as they leave bars.
Goodyear has two grant-funded vehicles and a light trailer for DUI enforcement, said police department spokeswoman Lisa Kutis.
Melissa Sanchez, 32, knows how dedicated agencies across the state are enforcing DUI laws. She racked up three DUIs — including one when she wasn't old enough to drink — in less than six years. Her third DUI, about eight years ago, was a felony that sent her to prison in Perryville for four months.
"You get in the car drunk and you go, 'It's not going to happen to me,' " she said.
But incarceration frightened Sanchez enough that she gave up drinking. She's spent the last 2½ years volunteering twice a month for Mothers Against Drunk Driving.
Jeff Gray said he was too young to feel the agony that came with the news of his father's death. But that doesn't keep him from occasionally pondering what it would be like to hear his father's voice and share a conversation.
"There is the piece of you that always wants to get to know your parents," he said.
Reporters Rebecca Smouse and Jackee Coe contributed to this article.
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What you could face if charged with DUI in Arizona
Editor's note: Arizona statute says it is against the law for a person to operate a motor vehicle while they are "impaired to the slightest degree." This means a police officer can arrest someone for DUI if their BAC is under .08. There is some variation in DUI penalties depending on court enforcement policies, said attorney Lawrence Koplow, partner of Ridenour, Hienton & Lewis, PLLC.
Standard DUI (BAC of .08 - .14)
First offense
You could face the following:
At least 10 days in jail with minimum of one day served
Total $1,500+ fine
Complete alcohol/drug screening, education and recommended treatment
Install an ignition interlock in all vehicles you drive for a minimum of six months
Minimum of eight points on driver's license, triggering need to go to traffic survival school
Three month license suspension with restricted privileges for last two months
Standard DUI (BAC of .08 - .14)
Second offense (within 84 months of the first conviction)
You could face the following:
At least 90 days in jail and 30 served consecutively
Total $3,000 fine
Driver's license revoked for one year
Complete alcohol/drug screening, education and recommended treatment
Install an ignition interlock in all vehicles you drive for one year after re-obtaining license
At least 30 hours of community service
Extreme DUI (BAC of .15 - .19)
First offense
You could face the following:
Minimum of 30 days in jail
Total $2,500 fine
Install an ignition interlock in all vehicles you drive for one year
Complete alcohol/drug screening, education and recommended treatment
Three month license suspension with restricted privileges for last two months
Extreme DUI (BAC of .15 - .19)
Second Offense: (if within 84 months of the first conviction)
You could face the following:
Minimum of 120 days in jail with 60 served consecutively
Total $3,250 fine
Driver's license revoked for one year
Install an ignition interlock in all vehicles you drive for one year after re-obtaining a license
Complete alcohol/drug screening, education and recommended treatment
At least 30 hours of community service
Source: Arizona statutes, with consultation from attorney Lawrence Koplow.
With Only 4 Major Types of Warship Left, Can the U.S. Navy Still Dominate the Seas?
By Rich Smith
July 20, 2014
It's budget-cutting time for the U.S. Navy. And while the admirals seem fine with this, Congress is getting nervous.
As reported on DefenseNews.com last week, there's a furious debate brewing between Congress and the Pentagon over the future of the Navy's cruiser fleet. In a nutshell, it goes like this: Currently, we have 22 Ticonderoga-class cruisers in the Navy. While sometimes dispatched on solo missions, or to lead a surface combatant task force, these cruisers' primary purpose is heading up the air defense squadrons protecting America's 11 aircraft carriers.
The Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruiser USS Vella Gulf (CG-72) recently completed a mission to the Black Sea, where Russian warplanes had just finished "buzzing" a U.S. destroyer. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
Problem is, America's cruisers are starting to look a little long in the tooth. Built in the 1980s and '90s by contractors General Dynamics (NYSE: GD ) and Huntington Ingalls (NYSE: HII ) , most of the Ticonderoga-class cruisers are nearing the end of their lifespans. By 2028, all 22 are expected to have lived out their useful service lives, worn out and ready for retirement.
And right now, we've got nothing to replace them.
A planned replacement class of warships, dubbed CG(X), was canceled in 2010 over worries the ships were becoming too expensive. What remains of that effort, and a sister program called DD(X), is what we now call the DDG-1000 program. It consists of a grand total of three planned "stealth" warships, built by General Dynamics at a cost of $3.5 billion apiece -- and they're not even full-sized cruisers, but just upsized destroyers.
The Navy thinks it has a solution to the problem. It has proposed taking 11 "CGs" out of service starting in 2019, and upgrading them to extend their service lives at a cost of $8.8 billion. The 11 cruisers still in service would still quietly expire by 2028. But the 11 upgraded ships should be good for another 15 years each and, after returning to the fleet, would keep us "in cruisers" through about 2045.
You can have half, or you can have nothing
The upshot? The Navy's giving Congress two choices: Either operate on half today's cruiser fleet for the next 30 years, or face the prospect of going 100% "cruiser-less" after 2028.
This half-or-nothing proposal has ruffled the feathers of defense hawks in Congress. Complicating matters further, some Congressmen worry that the Navy's real intention is to retire the first 11 cruisers, not upgrade them at all, and spend its money on other pet projects instead.
Crazy as it sounds -- worrying that the Navy has a secret agenda to shrink its own fleet -- it's not entirely without basis. After all, the withdraw-upgrade-reintroduce plan would see new-old cruisers returning to the fleet beginning around 2030. "Upgraded" or not, the newest of these ships would be 36 years old when it returns to service.
So what's the alternative?
There's no denying the U.S. Navy is looking rather sparse these days. The DDG-1000 program is stuck at just three ships, down from a planned 32-ship fleet. The last of the Oliver Hazard Perry-class frigates are on their way out the door. Now, we find that the Ticonderoga-class cruisers, too, are also on their last legs.
That leaves us with -- what? A few dozen attack submarines, and about 18 nuclear "boomers?" A handful of Littoral Combat Ships (also under attack)? And of the aircraft carriers -- of which we're supposed to have 11 -- only 10 are now afloat. The only ship that's being produced in real numbers these days is the Arleigh Burke-class (DDG-51) destroyer -- of which a total of 77 are planned.
At best, we're looking at a Navy heavily reliant upon just four major ship classes today -- and if we're being brutally honest, a Navy that's looking awfully one-dimensional, and overly reliant upon the DDG-51. Even if every problem in the world is a nail, I'm not sure the best solution is to hit them all with the hammer that is the $1.5 billion Arleigh Burke-class destroyers.
A modest suggestion
What the Navy really needs is to broaden its base. On the small ship side of things, the proposed Small Surface Combatant class of warships is one solution. But on the larger side of things, just slapping a new coat of paint on won't do the trick. The Navy really must get the CG(X) ball rolling again, and develop a viable large warship to replace its aging Ticonderogas.
How much would that cost? It won't be cheap, that's for sure. Figure a DDG-1000-like price tag of $3.5 billion per cruiser, and it could cost $77 billion to replace the Ticonderoga fleet -- a huge windfall for shipbuilders General Dynamics and Huntington Ingalls, and nearly nine times what they'd likely get for just "upgrading" 11 existing ships.
But considering that the primary mission of each of these cruisers will be defending taxpayers' investment in $13 billion Gerald R. Ford-class nuclear aircraft carriers, a new fleet of cruisers just might be worth the expense.
You can't afford to miss this
"Made in China" -- an all too familiar phrase. But not for much longer: There's a radical new technology out there, one that's already being employed by the U.S. Air Force, BMW, and even Nike. Respected publications like The Economist have compared this disruptive invention to the steam engine and the printing press; Business Insider calls it "the next trillion-dollar industry." Watch The Motley Fool's shocking video presentation to learn about the next great wave of technological innovation, one that will bring an end to "Made in China" for good. Click here!
The nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) (artist's rendering) is a very big boat. And taxpayers should expect to pay a very big bill to protect it. Photo: U.S. Navy.
Rich Smith has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends BMW and Nike and owns shares of General Dynamics and Nike. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Phoenix's attempt to curb puppy mills challenged
Caitlin McGlade, The Republic | azcentral.com 8:50 a.m. MST July 21, 2014
Pet store owners filed a federal lawsuit against the city in U.S. District Court in Arizona, saying Phoenix overstepped its authority.
Phoenix's attempt to quash the market for puppy-mill dogs has landed the city at the center of a national battle between the pet industry and animal-rights activists.
The city in December passed an ordinance that prohibits pet stores from selling dogs and cats from commercial breeders. The new law is aimed at mass-breeding facilities, often called puppy mills, that put profit over animal well-being.
Puppies 'N Love owners Frank and Vicki Mineo filed a federal lawsuit against the city in U.S. District Court in Arizona, saying Phoenix overstepped its authority and arguing that the new law would put them out of business. The owners say they don't purchase from puppy mills but rely on regulated breeders.
A federal judge granted an injunction to prohibit the city from enforcing the law on the Mineos' Paradise Valley Mall store until the case is resolved.
Puppies 'N Love operates three other stores in the Valley, as well as one in Tucson, that would not be affected by the ordinance.
Other businesses in Phoenix that sell dogs would still be subject to the ordinance, but representatives from both sides of the dispute couldn't point to a similar pet shop.
PetSmart and Petco patrons, for example, may occasionally see dogs and cats at the stores available for adoption, but both companies work only with rescue facilities and shelters.
Still, the lawsuit's outcome might affect more than just one business or the city's new law. It could set a precedent relevant to more than 50 cities that have implemented similar policies and others that want to do so.
Animal-welfare groups, breeders, pet-products companies and others are watching the case.
A spokesman for the Humane Society of the United States referred to Phoenix as ground zero.
"It's something of a test case, since these ordinances have started gaining traction across the country," said Dale Bartlett, a public-policy manager for the group's campaign against puppy mills. "It's absolutely something that the country is watching. It is to the City Council's credit that they're standing up and fighting this. It's an important battle that has to be waged."
Government officials are watching the case, too.
Tucson approved a similar ordinance, but it is on hold pending the Phoenix lawsuit. If the judge strikes down the Phoenix ordinance, Tucson will have to rework its version, said Tucson Vice Mayor Steve Kozachik. Miami-Dade County, Fla., officials are also closely monitoring the lawsuit as they work on their own proposal.
The pet marketplace has already shifted toward obtaining animals through rescue and non-profit groups, but laws like the one in Phoenix take that trend a step further by essentially granting those groups sole access to the market, said Patti Strand, president of the National Animal Interest Alliance.
"We're talking about a major change in the overall pet marketplace," Strand said. "(The lawsuit) is critically important — it will establish whether it's constitutional to do this."
Adding to the high stakes, the Humane Society of the United States joined Phoenix in the suit to defend the law.
Pet-industry groups, including the American Pet Products Association, the Pet Industry Joint Advisory Council and the Pet Industry Distributors Association, have pitched in $125,000 to aid the Mineos.
Mike Bober, a vice president of government affairs with the advisory council, said the laws are well-intentioned but punish the wrong people.
"A lot of local jurisdictions have attempted to address the issue of bad, out-of-state breeders by penalizing local pet stores in the belief that by somehow putting these pet stores out of business, they're going to hurt the breeders whose practices they disagree with," he said. "But it's not in the best interest of the pet store to work with someone who is cutting corners."
The Mineos are among the first pet-shop owners in the U.S. to challenge the restrictions on pet dealers.
Two others have since launched lawsuits challenging similar measures, one in Florida and the other in Rhode Island, but the cases are not as far along as the Phoenix case.
The Phoenix City Council passed the ordinance to combat cruel treatment of animals in some mass-breeding facilities and to reduce pet overpopulation. The law forbids pet shops from purchasing dogs or cats from sources other than non-profit rescue facilities or shelters.
Local animal-welfare groups say dogs from out-of-state puppy mills land here often. An official with the Arizona Animal Welfare League & SPCA said the organization has taken in nearly 100 castoffs from breeders the league considers puppy mills over the past year.
Many were mothers, bred until they couldn't breed anymore, and had psychological and physical problems, said Judith Gardner, director and CEO of the league. The most common problems included severe fearfulness and poor teeth, or missing teeth, from chewing at their wire cages, Gardner said.
While city ordinances like Phoenix's do not curb Internet sales, Bartlett said such laws are part a major movement to improve breeding conditions.
The Mineos say in the lawsuit that relying on shelters and non-profits for purebred dogs would drive Puppies 'N Love out of business because such venues seldom have purebred animals — the business' lifeblood.
And some opponents note that the law exempts small "backyard" breeders who may not have to adhere to the same state laws that pet shops do, such as being required to honor warranties for sick animals.
Jordan Moores, owner of Custom Creatures, a pet store in north-central Phoenix, said pet shops protect consumers because they are regulated. He plans to join the Mineos in their suit, saying non-profits are essentially gaining a monopoly.
The Mineos also say the ordinance violates a federal doctrine protecting interstate commerce because it locks commercial breeders, which are largely based in the Midwest, out of Phoenix.
However, the city says in court filings that its ordinance does not violate that clause because animal welfare and public health are generally exempt, and out-of-state businesses would see no greater impact than similar in-state businesses.
While the Mineos' complaint contends that state law recognizing pet-shop rights to sell commercially bred dogs trumps the city law, Phoenix notes that it has the right to pass stronger laws. The city also says the state law doesn't stipulate that city governments cannot restrict commercial pet sales.
Opponents of the ordinance say they favor laws that strengthen animal-care regulations over restrictions on stores' purchasing from breeders.
The Mineos said in court filings they have never used puppy mills and that they buy puppies only from small breeders and those with clean U.S. Department of Agriculture inspections.
But the Humane Society rejects the merits of USDA rules in its court filings, saying they do not ensure dogs' welfare.
Bartlett said the U.S. regulations do not limit the number of times a dog may be bred and do not require each dog to have annual veterinary checkups, although breeders must have a plan for a regular, visiting veterinarian.
Also, under the federal regulations, cages have to be only 6 inches wider than the dog's profile, he said.
Strand agrees that the USDA could do more. But, she said, "if you want to move the industry forward, devise laws for people to raise their standards."
Legalize drugs and halt organized drug crime
1:53 p.m. MST July 20, 2014
Regarding "Migrant kids, I feel for you, but go back home" (Opinions, Wednesday):
I disagree with the letter writer. The combination of America's insatiable drug habit and the dismal failure of the "war on drugs" is the cause of much of the violence in Mexico and and Central America. Just as alcohol prohibition escalated organized crime in the 20th century, our inability to manage our drug use is currently causing much of the violence in those countries, as well as in our country.
Most drugs should be legal, within a framework of regulations and taxation to provide the resources to help those who cannot manage their addictions. Organized drug crime, and the violence that goes with it, will fade, and the flood of kids crossing our border will subside.
— Ross Smith,
Scottsdale
There's more to legalizing pot than just boosting tax revenue
8:15 p.m. MST July 20, 2014
As a health professional, I cringe every time I read that we should legalize another addictive substance, marijuana, because we can incur tax revenue. (By the way, I support use of THC in appropriate medical situations.)
As a society, we must start making choices based on what is best for our collective health and work and life success. I urge people to look at the research. Marijuana use is known to cause chronic bronchitis and airway changes in the lungs; users suffer from impaired memory, thinking and problem-solving.
Even more alarming, chronic marijuana use changes the structure of the brain. Researchers are finding that regular use of cannabis may lower a person's IQ.
And, yes, the use of marijuana often leads to addiction. [Just like heroin and cigarettes??? yea, sure!!! What a lie!!!]
There are societal consequences, financially and in quality of life. If we want to continue to compete and lead in a global economy, we need healthy brains and bodies, and intelligent, motivated citizens.
— Diana Dellis,
Phoenix
Chandler schools use override funds to boost security
Karen Schmidt, The Republic | azcentral.com 9:31 a.m. MST July 21, 2014
Chandler schools are putting a hefty portion of the $9.6 million in taxpayer-funded override monies that are included in this year's budget toward beefing up security at its schools.
The district's $372 million total budget for 2014-15 is about a $13 million increase over last year, an increase due to voters approving a 15 percent maintenance-and-operations override last fall.
Maintenance-and-operations overrides are voter-approved tax increases that help districts surpass their budget limits by a certain percentage to pay for classroom-related expenses and teacher salaries and benefits.
The Chandler Unified School District last November asked voters to approve its override request to offset more than $36 million in funding cuts by the state during the Great Recession and to enhance security, maintain smaller student-teacher ratios and fund extracurricular activities.
The override is a 5 percent increase of the district's previous 10 percent override. The district asked for an extra 5 percent to address the community's security concerns.
The 15 percent override will bring in $28.9 million to CUSD over its seven-year lifespan.
Chandler schools budget 2014-2015
Here's a look at some of the key areas where the district will be spending its money.
Security
Teachers
Two new schools
Equipment
Food/transportation
Chandler Unified School District
The Republic - azcentral.com
The growing district also will receive approximately $800,000 in state funding to help it accommodate its growing student population, which is projected to increase by more than 1,000 students this school year. CUSD for years has been a growth district, and administrators expect the trend to continue for several years. To accommodate growth, the district has hired 50 teachers and is building two schools.
The district also has eight new bus routes for special-education students and says it needs to hire more bus drivers.
According to a recent audit of district finances, CUSD put more than 60 percent of its funding into the classroom.
Chandler Unified's budget
A look at key areas where the Chandler Unified School District will spend its money:
$4.1 million in override funds to pay for a master keying system for the district; new door hardware so teachers and staff can lock classroom doors, media centers, computer labs, gyms, nurse offices and cafeterias from the inside; and modify or build 7-foot-high fences and gates at 12 schools to control access and create a barrier from public areas.
$336, 798 for 10 new full-time security guards.
$5.7 million toward an average 3.4 percent salary increase for teachers and staff. This is part of the district's efforts and long-term plan to attract and retain quality teachers and staff.
$6 million in adjacent ways taxpayer funds for access and utilities for two new schools the district is building. The district is building a K-6 school and a school for grades 7 through 12.
$15.7 million of maintenance-and-operations funds for food services.
About $130 million in M&O funds and voter-approved Proposition 301 state funds for teacher salaries and benefits.
$9.3 million transportation-related costs.
About $3 million to hire 50 teachers to accommodate the district's growing student population.
$2.6 million for library books, textbooks and instructional aids. $85,000 is for library books; $1.9 million for textbooks and a little more than $700,000 on instructional aids.
$1.2 million for technology hardware and software.
$1.7 million on furniture and equipment.
Source: Chandler Unified School District
Where Chandler school funds go
How Chandler schools told taxpayers it would spend its override funds:
Fully implement the programs related to our long-range strategic plan, Journey 2020.
Enhance security by hiring additional security guards and bolstering safety features in schools.
Help the district attract and retain exceptional teachers.
Reduce the district's need to eliminate effective programs and services to students and parents.
Maintain or improve student-teacher ratio.
Provide professional development for teachers to increase student achievement.
Help the district recover $36 million in budget cuts over a four-year span.
Source: Chandler Unified School District
Chandler schools budget 2014-2015
7 ways Chandler schools told taxpayers it would spend the override funds:
1. Implement new programs
To fully implement the programs related to our long-range strategic plan, Journey 2020.
2. Hire more security guards
To enhance security by hiring additional security guards and bolstering safety features in schools.
3. Hire and retain teachers
To help the district attract and retain exceptional teachers.
4. Stop cutting programs
To reduce the district's need to eliminate effective programs and services to students and parents.
5. Improve student-teacher ratio
To maintain or improve student-teacher ratio.
6. Provide teacher development
To provide professional development for teachers to increase student achievement.
7. Balance past budget cuts
To help the district recover the $36 million in budget cuts over a four-year span.
Chandler Unified School District
Pearce hypocrisy shines in new government job
1:38 p.m. MST July 20, 2014
It is especially curious that a man who has spent his career decrying the size and efficiency of government that Russell Pearce's jobs have ranged from a county sheriff to the director of the Arizona Motor Vehicle Division (fired from that job), and from a member of the state Legislature (recalled from office) to a position at the Maricopa County Treasurer's Office. (This is thanks to his buddy, Treasurer Charles Hoskins.)
This very important county job, which has been vacant for several years, and which pays $85,000 a year, has only one person qualified to fill it — Russell Pearce!
Interesting that someone who likes efficient government and low taxes, will leave with a boost to the pension he's already receiving.
— Rob Mariani,
Phoenix
Sign spinners shouldn't be out in the day's heat
1:56 p.m. MST July 20, 2014
Recently I drove by a street corner where a man was carrying a large sign advertising a nearby furniture store. He looked overwhelmed by the heat.
I hope those companies advertising in this way would reconsider a more humane way. I realize people need jobs but perhaps other ways can be considered, especially when daytime highs are 105 and higher.
— Mary Scott,
Gilbert
Investigation: ATF drug stings targeted minorities
Brad Heath, USA TODAY 10:19 p.m. EDT July 20, 2014
WASHINGTON — The nation's top gun-enforcement agency overwhelmingly targeted racial and ethnic minorities as it expanded its use of controversial drug sting operations, a USA TODAY investigation shows.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has more than quadrupled its use of those stings during the past decade, quietly making them a central part of its attempts to combat gun crime. The operations are designed to produce long prison sentences for suspects enticed by the promise of pocketing as much as $100,000 for robbing a drug stash house that does not actually exist.
At least 91% of the people agents have locked up using those stings were racial or ethnic minorities, USA TODAY found after reviewing court files and prison records from across the United States. Nearly all were either black or Hispanic. That rate is far higher than among people arrested for big-city violent crimes, or for other federal robbery, drug and gun offenses.
The ATF operations raise particular concerns because they seek to enlist suspected criminals in new crimes rather than merely solving old ones, giving agents and their underworld informants unusually wide latitude to select who will be targeted. In some cases, informants said they identified targets for the stings after simply meeting them on the street.
"There's something very wrong going on here," said University of Chicago law professor Alison Siegler, part of a team of lawyers challenging the ATF's tactics in an Illinois federal court. "The government is creating these crimes and then choosing who it's going to target."
Current and former ATF officials insist that race plays no part in the operations. Instead, they said, agents seek to identify people already committing violent robberies in crime-ridden areas, usually focusing on those who have amassed long and violent rap sheets.
"There is no profiling going on here," said Melvin King, ATF's deputy assistant director for field operations, who has supervised some of the investigations. "We're targeting the worst of the worst, and we're looking for violent criminals that are using firearms in furtherance of other illegal activities."
STINGS RUN INTO A LEGAL BACKLASH
The ATF's stash-house investigations already face a legal backlash. Two federal judges in California ruled this year that agents violated the Constitution by setting people up for "fictitious crime" they wouldn't otherwise commit; a federal appeals court in Chicago is weighing whether an operation there amounted to entrapment. Even some of the judges who have signed off on the operations have expressed misgivings about them.
On top of that, defense lawyers in three states have charged that ATF is profiling minority suspects. They asked judges to force the Justice Department to turn over records they hope will prove those claims. Last year, the chief federal judge in Chicago, U.S. District Court Judge Ruben Castillo, agreed and ordered government lawyers to produce a trove of information, saying there was a "strong showing of potential bias."
Justice Department lawyers fought to block the disclosures. In one case in Chicago, the department refused to comply with another judge's order that it produce information about the stings. The records it has so far produced in other cases remain sealed.
Because of that secrecy, the data compiled by USA TODAY offer the broadest evidence yet that ATF's operations have overwhelmingly had minority suspects in their cross hairs. The newspaper identified a sample of 635 defendants arrested in stash-house stings during the past decade, and found 579, or 91%, were minorities.
The ATF said it could not confirm those figures because the agency does not track the demographics of the people it arrests in stash-house cases.
That alone is troubling, said Emma Andersson, a staff attorney for the ACLU's Criminal Law Reform Project. "Management is simply putting its head in the sand," she said.
Other police agencies routinely collect that type of information to monitor racial profiling, and Attorney General Eric Holder said in April that the Justice Department would attempt to do so, as well. "To be successful in reducing both the experience and the perception of bias, we must have verifiable data about the problem," Holder said at the time.
"It's not enough to say we're not purposely targeting young men of color," said Katharine Tinto, a professor at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law who has studied the ATF's tactics. "When you have a possibly discriminatory effect, it should still require you to go back and look at the structure of the operation," including where and how agents choose to conduct the operations.
HOW ATF CHOOSES ITS TARGETS
ATF guidelines require that field supervisors and officials in Washington approve each stash-house sting. The reviews focus mostly on ensuring that suspects have a sufficiently serious record to justify such a costly, and at times dangerous, undercover investigation; officials said they do not include any consideration of the suspect's race.
The ATF declined to explain how it selects the stings' targets, other than to say its agents rely on criminal records, police intelligence files and confidential informants to identify people already responsible for violent robberies. Still, court records raise questions about how and where those informants go about finding suspects.
In one case in San Diego, a government informant, identified in court records only by the pseudonym "Tony," testified that he sometimes approached people on the street to see if they wanted to commit a drug robbery. Which streets, defense attorney John Kirby asked.
"Different neighborhoods. I have targeted all kinds of areas," the informant replied.
"Do you do it in La Jolla?" Kirby asked, referring to the well-to-do seaside section of San Diego.
"I'm not familiar with La Jolla," he replied.
"Scripps Ranch?" Kirby asked, referring to another.
"No."
Kirby, a former federal prosecutor, said it was clear to him ATF informants were "trolling what was almost exclusively an African-American neighborhood, and there aren't a lot of those in San Diego."
The ATF offers a suspected robber the chance to steal 40 kilograms of cocaine.
In another case, a federal appeals court judge said the ATF dispatched an informant "to randomly recruit 'bad guys' in a 'bad part of town.' " The judge, Stephen Reinhardt, went on to express doubts about "whether the government may target poor, minority neighborhoods and seek to tempt their residents to commit crimes that might well result in their escape from poverty," calling that approach an "open invitation to racial discrimination."
A California federal judge similarly accused ATF agents this year of "trolling poor neighborhoods" for suspects before he dismissed criminal charges against three men. The government has appealed that decision.
The stings are engineered to produce prison sentences of a decade or more, mostly by capitalizing on federal laws that impose tough mandatory penalties for people who conspire to possess large quantities of drugs — even if those drugs don't actually exist.
Another USA TODAY investigation last year found that although the ATF stash-house operations have succeeded in locking up some well-armed suspects with long records of violence, they have also swept up scores of low-level crooks who jumped at the potential payday for a few hours of work. One investigation targeted off-duty Army Rangers; in another, agents had to supply their would-be armed robbers with a gun.
USATODAY
ATF uses fake drugs, big bucks to snare suspects
The ATF cut its use of stash-house stings by more than half this year, in part because "you've advertised this technique," King said.
King, who is black, said he had approved some stings and rejected others, looking only at the suspect's criminal record and never at his race. "When I hear that argument that ATF is targeting minorities or, in particular, African Americans, I find it offensive because that means I would be a party to such an unfair thing," King said. "It's the furthest thing from the truth."
MINORITY ARRESTS, BUT IS IT PROFILING?
To prove that the ATF has engaged in profiling, suspects must go beyond showing that the ATF's tactics have led to a large percentage of minority arrests. Instead, they also must find similarly situated white people who were not prosecuted, then show that the government was discriminating on purpose — a legal barrier few overcome.
Even getting judges to order the government to release records in pursuit of such a claim is uncommon, Siegler said. The judges who ordered disclosure based their decisions mostly on records showing that nearly all of people arrested in ATF stings in Chicago were minorities. "The numbers are troubling. Judges see these numbers, and they feel like there's something going on here that's not quite right," she said.
USA TODAY identified suspects' races using federal prison data and other records. It identified Hispanic suspects by comparing their names to a U.S. Census Bureau list of "heavily Hispanic" surnames, an approach widely used for identifying trends based on ethnicity. (The U.S. Bureau of Prisons, which lists inmates' races on its website, said it would violate a federal privacy law to also disclose whether they are Hispanic.) Where possible, USA TODAY verified that information with other police records or the suspects' lawyers.
More than 55% of the suspects USA TODAY identified were black; more than 33% were Hispanic.
Those numbers appear unusual even in the context of a criminal justice system that already is made up mostly of blacks and Hispanics. Minorities are about a third of the nation's population, but are nearly three-quarters of federal prison inmates.
By comparison, about 76% of the people charged with violent crimes in the nation's major cities are minorities. Minorities make up about 72% of the people serving prison sentences for murder, and about 71% of people convicted of federal gun and drug offenses.
Beyond that, the demographics of ATF's stings appear lopsided even after accounting for suspects' criminal records, USA TODAY found after reviewing data from the U.S. Sentencing Commission. Every person sentenced to federal prison is assigned a numerical "criminal history" score based on his or her prior convictions. Among defendants with the very worst criminal records, minorities made up less than 72% of defendants in other federal drug, gun and robbery cases
Justice Department officials reject most such comparisons. In a court filing this year, government lawyers said the only way suspects could show they had been targeted because of their race would be to find another person "who told a confidential informant or an undercover agent about a desire to commit an armed robbery and then was either not approached during a proactive investigation or who was approached and then not prosecuted, solely because of his race."
Contributing: Mark Hannan
Follow investigative reporter Brad Heath on Twitter: @bradheath.
ATF Arming Robbers in Hatched Plots, Leaving Many Dead
Kit Daniels
Infowars.com
June 30, 2013
In sting operations similar to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing which left six dead, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms are pressuring and arming people to rob fictitious drug “stash houses” and the busts have left at least seven people dead, according to USA Today.
In these ATF sting operations, an informant recruits a targeted individual for an undercover ATF agent who pretends to be a disgruntled drug cartel courier.
Either the informant or the ATF agent suggests the possibility of robbing a stash house containing hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of cocaine.
The ATF agent explains that he needs a robbery crew to help him overtake armed guards in the house and steal the cocaine. Once the crew meets to prepare for the armed robbery, federal authorities bust them.
Several of the busts have lead to the deaths of suspects who shot at or tried to run down agents in an attempt to flee.
Informants are paid by the ATF to pressure people to join the fake robberies. Individuals may be targeted simply because the informants know them through work or a personal connection, just like a raffle ticket sale.
In preparation for the fake stash house raids, ATF agents are outfitting robbery crews, supplying vehicles and firearms to would-be robbers who only own bus tokens and pellet guns.
No doubt the ATF is taking notes from the FBI, who provided a wannabe terrorist with dummy explosives loaded in a van personally chauffeured by an FBI agent to the intended blast site.
“The ATF has a standard playbook for such operations,” said Judge William J. Bauer in a Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals opinion.
“The facts between cases are frequently nearly identical.”
In United States v. Mayfield, an ATF informant knew that his co-worker, 41-year-old Leslie Mayfield, had a criminal past, although fairly distant.
Mayfield complained about his low wage; his criminal history presumably prevented him from higher-paying jobs.
After Mayfield crashed his car and couldn’t afford repairs, the informant lent him money while suggesting he help him rob a stash house.
Mayfield refused for several weeks, more than likely because he didn’t want to restart his long lost criminal career.
But the informant continued to pressure Mayfield into committing the crime, pointing to his gang tattoos, presumably to threaten Mayfield into paying back the debt.
Mayfield finally acquiesced out of fear for his life and to the allure of over $100,000 in only a few hours of work. But the money did not exist and a court sentenced Mayfield to 27 years in prison.
The judge barred Mayfield from an entrapment defense.
In his opinion on the case, Judge Richard Posner of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed with both the sentence given to Mayfield and the ATF sting operations as a whole.
“Before succumbing to the blandishments of the informant, Mayfield was working at an honest job,” said Posner.
“Now, as a result of the sting, we the taxpayers will be supporting him at considerable expense for the next quarter century. Does that make any sense?”
According to Posner, fictitious stash house stings help real stash houses at the expense of the taxpayers.
The ATF stings eliminate potential stash house robbers and deters others from stash house robberies because they might turn out to be stings.
“The greater security that fictitious stash house stings confer on real stash houses, security obtained at no cost to the operators of stash houses, reduces their cost of self-protection,” said Posner. “Which is a principal cost of the illegal-drug business.”
“The operators of stash houses would pay lay enforcement to sting potential stash house robbers.”
Sources:
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/06/27/atf-stash-houses-sting-usa-today-investigation/2457109/
http://www.lb7.uscourts.gov/documents/10-3725op.pdf
6 questions about the IRS’s missing emails, from IT experts
By Josh Hicks July 21 at 7:00 AM
Did the IRS intentionally lose e-mails to cover up potentially incriminating communications relating to the agency’s targeting controversy, or did the records go missing because of bad technology management?
As for the latter question, few organizations are in a better position to make an assessment of the situation than the International Association of Information Technology Asset Managers, which deals with these types of issues on a regular basis.
The group, which runs the only worldwide certification program for IT asset managers, released six questions on Monday that it thinks lawmakers and federal investigators should ask about the missing e-mails of former IRS official Lois Lerner, a central figure in the targeting affair.
To review, the IRS said it lost years worth of Lerner’s e-mails when her hard drive crashed in 2011. The agency also said it destroyed the device after trying to recover the data with help from its IT specialists and forensics experts.
Although this issue has become politicized, there’s little doubt that authorities should look into the matter. After all, National Archivist David Ferriero told a congressional committee at a hearing last month that the IRS “did not follow the law” when it failed to inform the National Archives and Records Administration of Lerner’s lost e-mails.
IAITAM president and founder Barbara Rembiesa posed the following questions for the IRS in a news release on Monday:
1.) What happened to the IRS’s IT asset managers who appear to have disappeared at a key juncture?
Ordering the destruction of a hard drive and documenting that process would be handled by trained, certified IT asset managers, according to IAITAM. But the group’s records show that at least three IRS IT asset managers were shuffled out of their positions around the time of the May 2013 inspector general’s report that detailed the agency’s targeting practices.
IAITAM said investigators need to “determine if these in-house IT asset managers were removed from the picture as the IRS email investigation heated up.”
2.) Where is the documentation to prove that the IRS wiped or destroyed Lois Lerner’s hard drive?
So far, we only have the word of IRS officials. IAITAM said its standards call for clear proof and records of destruction when drives are wiped or eliminated. “Until that documentation is provided, the hard drives should be considered lost, not destroyed,” Rembiesa said.
3.) Were the drives destroyed by an outside vendor or firm? If so, by who, and can they verify the destruction?
Hiring a specialized firm to destroy IT assets is not unusual for federal agencies, according to IAITAM. If the IRS used this method to destroy Lerner’s hard drive, there would be an additional layer of documentation to show that the action took place, the group said.
4.) What are the IRS’s specific policies and procedures on document retention when hard drives are damaged or destroyed?
The IRS almost certainly has specific policies and procedures for reclaiming and destroying hard drives, according to IAITAM. “In large organizations, hard drives don’t just get bulk erased,” Rembiesa said.
If the IRS followed its standards properly, there would be documentation of failed attempts to recover data from the hard drives and for destroying them. So far, we only have e-mails that the IRS released showing that Lerner was working with IT specialists to recover her files and that those efforts failed.
5.) What is the IRS’s disaster-recovery policy?
Loss of data at large organizations is fairly common, but failing to find a way to recover the data is not common, according to IAITAM. The group said investigators need to understand exactly what the IRS would typically do when data is lost, as well as whether the agency followed those guidelines in Lerner’s case, and, if not, then why.
6.) Where are Lois Lerner’s Blackberry e-mails?
IAITAM said investigators need to determine whether the IRS’s Blackberry communications are secure and what is on the “enterprise server.”
“It is difficult to imagine that none of the emails in question were done on a mobile basis,” Rembiesa said. “If so, there may be a freestanding stream of email records that would not be impacted by the Lerner hard drive loss.”
Josh Hicks covers the federal government and anchors the Federal Eye blog. He reported for newspapers in the Detroit and Seattle suburbs before joining the Post as a contributor to Glenn Kessler’s Fact Checker blog in 2011.
D.C. man exonerated in 1982 rape and murder; DNA reveals FBI error in conviction
By Keith L. Alexander and Spencer S. Hsu July 21 at 11:34 AM
A D.C. Superior Court judge concluded Monday that DNA evidence exonerates a man who spent 26 years in prison for the 1982 rape and murder of a Washington woman.
Kevin Martin’s case marks the fifth time in as many years that federal prosecutors in D.C. acknowledged that errors by an elite FBI forensic unit have led to a wrongful conviction.
U.S. attorney Ronald C. Machen Jr. joined defense calls to vacate Martin’s conviction and declare him innocent of the rape and murder of Ursula C. Brown. Machen cited DNA evidence that contradicts a previous finding by forensic experts linking Martin to a hair collected at the scene.
Martin, who had long professed innocence in the killing, left the D.C. courthouse with his name cleared. He was paroled in 2009 and lives in San Francisco.
“I am free at last. I am humbled. I never gave up,” Martin said, hugging and high-fiving his attorneys. Martin’s younger sister, his fiancée, his 6-year-old niece and other family members gathered around.
“I just want to live,” said Martin, 50,
The hearing came as Machen’s office nears the end of a 2-1 / 2 year review of all local convictions involving FBI hair matches that was launched in 2012 after demands by the D.C. Public Defender Service. The service has worked to exonerate four men convicted by such matches since 2009. And the troubling problems exposed in the FBI lab’s methods have led the FBI and Justice Department to undertake a nationwide review of more than 2,100 convictions in the 1980s and 1990s.
Martin’s is the first exoneration uncovered by District prosecutors, who also say it is the only one found by the local review. PDS praised the effort to clear Martin’s name but criticized the U.S. Attorney’s Office review as secretive and the disclosure of results as incomplete and overdue.
Brown, 19, was abducted on Nov. 1, 1982, after her car was struck from behind on the Anacostia Freeway, during a rash of what authorities called “bump-and-rob” assaults. Her partially clothed body was later found near a dumpster next to an elementary school in Southeast Washington. She had been shot in the head and stabbed.
Martin was arrested and pleaded guilty to a series of similar armed robberies that occurred one week later, but maintained he knew nothing about Brown’s death.
But after prosecutors said an FBI Laboratory examiner matched a pubic hair found on Brown’s sneaker and was prepared to testify it was Martin’s, Martin entered an Alford plea. Under such a plea, a defendant acknowledges that prosecutors have sufficient evidence for a conviction but do not admit guilt.
.
Martin was sentenced in 1984 to 35 years to life in prison for manslaughter and robbery. He was paroled in 2009 after prosecutors agree that his sentence should be reduced.
While the hair could not be located during the review, modern-day testing of biological evidence at the crime excluded him as the source, attorneys said.
In court papers, Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael T. Ambrosino and Martin’s attorney Bernard Grimm wrote that the “DNA testing conducted at the expense of the government along with other factors . . . conclusively establish that Kevin Martin is innocent of the rape and murder of Ursula Brown.”
In December 2009, D.C. Superior Court Judge Fred B. Ugast exonerated and ordered the release of another man, Donald E. Gates, then 60, after DNA results cleared him of a rape-murder for which he had spent 28 years in prison.
Gates’s counsel, the D.C. Public Defender Service, also discovered that for 12 years prosecutors failed to disclose that the Justice Department’s inspector general in 1997 had criticized the FBI agent who had linked Gates’s hair to the crime, and that flaws were later found in that evidence.
Ugast ordered Machen’s office to review all cases handled by the agent, Michael P. Malone. In 2012, facing continued demands by PDS, Machen ordered a review of all convictions that relied on FBI hair analysis.
Since then, Superior Court judges have exonerated three more wrongfully convicted PDS clients — Santae A. Tribble and Cleveland Wright, of two connected murders; and Kirk L. Odom of rape — after DNA tests contradicted claims by FBI hair examiners . The three men collectively spent nearly 80 years in prison.
Their cases were featured in the Post, and the FBI and Justice Department in 2012 announced they would review FBI testimony in all convictions involving FBI hair matches in the 1980s and 1990s.
Unlike the four previous D.C. cases, Martin’s was uncovered by the review by Machen’s office, which this winter asked Martin’s attorney if he wanted new DNA testing.
Martin had sought DNA tests in 2001, but D.C. police said evidence was lost. Police subsequently moved evidence from a decrepit warehouse into a new facility, re-inventorying and bar-coding the contents, and Martin’s evidence file was found last November, according to court papers released by Grimm.
In March, as first reported by Fox 5, Martin learned that DNA testing excluded him as a source of biological evidence collected from the victim.
Exoneration would free Martin from having to register as a sex offender and allow him to seek compensation from the government.
Grimm praised Machen’s office, saying: “Had the U.S. attorney’s office not reviewed these cases, Kevin Martin never would have found out that evidence could be retested, and he still would be on parole for rape and homicide.”
Machen’s office said its inquiry identified 122 District convictions before 2000 that included an FBI hair match, completed reviewing 106 of them, and found only one case, Martin’s, in which prosecutors believed the conviction depended on the FBI finding, or in which DNA testing would yield a “viable” claim for innocence, Machen spokesman Bill Miller said.
Miller said prosecutors will begin notifying defendants’ last counsel of record in the 106 cases, beginning Monday with the Public Defender Service, and also notify the Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project for defendants with other counsel, in case those lawyers had retired, moved or died.
PDS said prosecutors’ approach may not have led to the reversal of Gates, Tribble or Wright’s convictions because PDS was not their last counsel. They said that for more than four years, prosecutors refused repeated requests to release the names of all defendants whose convictions relied on FBI hair evidence to PDS, the standards for their review, or to disclose cases as reviews were completed.
Last Wednesday, a new report by the Justice Department inspector general’s office criticized the department and FBI for failing to give proper and timely notice to defendants in cases affected by internal reviews of cases, such as Gates’s, and said the department should work with public defenders, among other outside entities.
“The U.S. Attorney’s Office appears to have learned very little from the errors devastatingly portrayed in [the] OIG report. This report shows that delay is inexcusable and that it can have tragic consequences,” said Sandra K. Levick, chief of special litigation for the D.C. PDS.
Machen’s office said it did not have all names four years ago and that it took great effort to identify cases based on FBI lab reports.
Miller said Machen’s office devoted thousands of hours involving 30 experienced prosecutors in the review of scores of decades-old cases, and asked leaders of the local defense bar including PDS to alert the office to post-conviction innocence claims.
At the close of the Monday hearing, D.C. Superior Court Judge Robert I. Richter wished Martin well.
“Take care Mr. Martin,” he said. “You look like a happy man. I’m glad to see this.”
Get updates on your area delivered via e-mail
Keith Alexander covers crime, specifically D.C. Superior Court cases for The Washington Post. He has covered dozens of crime stories from Banita Jacks, the Washington woman charged with killing her four daughters, to the murder trial of intern Chandra Levy.
Spencer S. Hsu is an investigative reporter, two-time Pulitzer finalist and national Emmy award nominee.
Gilbert church receives a sign from (close to) heaven
Arizona Republic columnist EJ Montini looks into why the Gilbert church-sign case will be heard by the Supreme Court.
EJ Montini, columnist | azcentral.com 5 p.m. MST July 21, 2014
Not long ago the small but devout congregation of the Good News Presbyterian Church in Gilbert got a sign from …
No, not God. But close.
The U.S. Supreme Court.
The church learned that the nation's highest court had agreed to hear its case against the city over the roadside signs posted by church members the day before worship services. Stories like this can get drown out in all the day's shouting. It shouldn't.
Essentially, Gilbert has different rules for different signs. According to an article by the Arizona Republic's Parker Leavitt, non-commercial event signs (like those advertising a church service) cannot be placed near a road earlier than 12 hours before the event.
On the other hand, political signs, like those now on street corners all across the Valley, can be planted 60 days before an election. Also, some non-commercial signs can be posted indefinitely.
The church thought this was unfair. Still, fighting city hall would seem to be impossible for a congregation with only a few dozen members, one that holds its weekly services in a senior living facility.
At least until their cause was taken up by Alliance Defending Freedom, a "legal ministry" with a Scottsdale base that, according to its website, "has brought together thousands of Christian attorneys and like-minded organizations that work tirelessly to advocate for the right of people to freely live out their faith in America and around the world."
One of those attorneys is Matt Sharp.
"This little church is having its concerns taken up by the highest court in the land," he said. "That's pretty cool."
It's also pretty serious. The Supreme Court doesn't do favors. But it sometimes uses a case brought by a little guy to resolve a much larger issue.
"To us, this is a case about religious freedom and about free speech," Sharp said. "In this instance, the religious content of a sign shouldn't be a determining factor in how long they get to speak, how big they get to speak, where the signs are located. The case really merges the two issues and asks to what extent does the First Amendment protect all speech?"
The church lost in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. But similar cases in other parts of the country have gone the other way. So the court's decision to take the Gilbert case (officially called Reed vs. Town of Gilbert) might be its way of trying to settle things. The court should hear the case later this year and issue a ruling around this time next year.
Sharp said there would not have been any problem if Gilbert had created rules that were "content neutral," in other words, the same for everyone.
"Once the government gets into the business of deciding which speech is more important it's a dangerous proposition," he said. "That's why we think it will go our way."
On the other hand, Gilbert town attorney said he expects the Supreme Court to rule in the town's favor.
Given the gaudy campaign banners and markers that have sprouted up like weeds on just about every Valley street corner I'm hoping the court will go off on a tangent and ban all political signs.
Now that would be a miracle.
3 teens accused of killing 2 homeless men
Albuquerque police arrested three teens accused of beating to death two homeless men who were sleeping in a vacant lot.
Associated Press 12:02 p.m. MST July 21, 2014
Homeless men killed
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Three teenagers accused of fatally beating two homeless men beyond recognition with cinderblocks, bricks and a metal fence pole may have been terrorizing transients around Albuquerque for months, police said Monday.
Alex Rios, 18, and two boys, ages 16 and 15, are scheduled for arraignment Monday on murder charges in the Friday night slayings. The 15-year-old told police the attack lasted more than an hour, and that the trio took turns picking up cinderblocks over their heads and smashing them into the faces of the men who had been sleeping in a field across from his home, according to a criminal complaint.
A third transient who escaped led police to the boys, whom he said were known for attacking homeless people. The 15-year-old told police the trio had attacked more than 50 people over the last year. And his father told an Albuquerque television station there were rumors his son was violent, but he assumed it was with other kids.
Gilbert Prieto told KOB-TV ( http://bit.ly/1p2f1uE ) that he has no idea what prompted the beatings, and that he and his family had once been homeless themselves.
"It's so hard that he could do that to someone where… I mean, like I said, we came from there," said Prieto, the father of the 15- and 16-year-olds accused. "You know what I mean? We're not there now, but that's where we… We got out of there," Prieto said.
According to the criminal complaint, the teens came home from a party and one of them was "very angry" over a breakup with a longtime girlfriend. So they covered their faces with black T-shirts and went out to look for someone to beat up and possibly rob.
The attack was so brutal it stunned even veteran police officers.
"I personally, after reading that complaint, was sick to my stomach because of the nature of the violence and the age of the offenders," police spokesman Simon Drobik said.
Officers responded Saturday around 8 a.m. to a 911 call reporting the two bodies in a field. They found one victim lying on a mattress and another lying on the ground. Jerome Eskeets, a third victim who said he was able to flee, was hospitalized with injuries.
Eskeets told police that he recognized one of the "kids" hitting and kicking him as someone who lived in a house nearby, and police found the trio of suspects there. Prieto said the 15- and 16-year-old were his sons and Rios was a friend who had spent the night.
The complaint says Rios has been charged with two counts each of murder, among other charges. The younger boys will likely be charged with murder as adults, Drobik said. The Associated Press is withholding their names because of their ages.
Rios told investigators he acted as a lookout while the other boys attacked both men with bricks, sticks and a metal fence pole. The younger suspects, however, told police that Rios also took part in the attacks.
Investigators have not yet confirmed the identities of the two victims, although police did find an Arizona driver's license at the home where the boys were. Their transient background and the severity of their injuries have made identification difficult, Drobik said.
The department is asking anyone in the homeless community with information about other attacks to get in touch with them. Drobik said those uncomfortable approaching police can contact them through any social service agency.
"Just please come forward," Drobik said.
3 teens accused of killing 2 homeless men
Albuquerque police arrested three teens accused of beating to death two homeless men who were sleeping in a vacant lot.
Associated Press 12:02 p.m. MST July 21, 2014
Homeless men killed
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Three teenagers accused of fatally beating two homeless men beyond recognition with cinderblocks, bricks and a metal fence pole may have been terrorizing transients around Albuquerque for months, police said Monday.
Alex Rios, 18, and two boys, ages 16 and 15, are scheduled for arraignment Monday on murder charges in the Friday night slayings. The 15-year-old told police the attack lasted more than an hour, and that the trio took turns picking up cinderblocks over their heads and smashing them into the faces of the men who had been sleeping in a field across from his home, according to a criminal complaint.
A third transient who escaped led police to the boys, whom he said were known for attacking homeless people. The 15-year-old told police the trio had attacked more than 50 people over the last year. And his father told an Albuquerque television station there were rumors his son was violent, but he assumed it was with other kids.
Gilbert Prieto told KOB-TV ( http://bit.ly/1p2f1uE ) that he has no idea what prompted the beatings, and that he and his family had once been homeless themselves.
"It's so hard that he could do that to someone where… I mean, like I said, we came from there," said Prieto, the father of the 15- and 16-year-olds accused. "You know what I mean? We're not there now, but that's where we… We got out of there," Prieto said.
According to the criminal complaint, the teens came home from a party and one of them was "very angry" over a breakup with a longtime girlfriend. So they covered their faces with black T-shirts and went out to look for someone to beat up and possibly rob.
The attack was so brutal it stunned even veteran police officers.
"I personally, after reading that complaint, was sick to my stomach because of the nature of the violence and the age of the offenders," police spokesman Simon Drobik said.
Officers responded Saturday around 8 a.m. to a 911 call reporting the two bodies in a field. They found one victim lying on a mattress and another lying on the ground. Jerome Eskeets, a third victim who said he was able to flee, was hospitalized with injuries.
Eskeets told police that he recognized one of the "kids" hitting and kicking him as someone who lived in a house nearby, and police found the trio of suspects there. Prieto said the 15- and 16-year-old were his sons and Rios was a friend who had spent the night.
The complaint says Rios has been charged with two counts each of murder, among other charges. The younger boys will likely be charged with murder as adults, Drobik said. The Associated Press is withholding their names because of their ages.
Rios told investigators he acted as a lookout while the other boys attacked both men with bricks, sticks and a metal fence pole. The younger suspects, however, told police that Rios also took part in the attacks.
Investigators have not yet confirmed the identities of the two victims, although police did find an Arizona driver's license at the home where the boys were. Their transient background and the severity of their injuries have made identification difficult, Drobik said.
The department is asking anyone in the homeless community with information about other attacks to get in touch with them. Drobik said those uncomfortable approaching police can contact them through any social service agency.
"Just please come forward," Drobik said.
Constitutional rights??? You ain't got not stinking Constitutional rights around thugs with badges and guns!!!!
"The investigation found that 20% of the
city's officers reported uses of force
that were either unconstitutional or
unnecessary"
Newark police to get federal monitor after civil rights violations
By James Queally
July 22, 2014, 9:00 a.m.
New Jersey's largest police department repeatedly violated residents' civil rights, used excessive force and failed to discipline officers for a wide range of misconduct, according to the results of a federal investigation made public Tuesday.
The Newark Police Department, a 1,000-member force that patrols one of the most violent cities in the Northeast, will be placed under federal oversight, ending a three-year investigation into rampant misconduct in the agency, according to a statement from the Justice Department and documents reviewed by the Los Angeles Times.
The federal investigation was launched in 2011, less than a year after a scathing report from the American Civil Liberties Union said the police department was incapable of policing itself.
The investigation found that city police officers had no constitutional basis for 75% of the pedestrian stops they conducted in recent years. It also determined that officers often used excessive force during arrests but underreported the level of force used.
"The people of Newark deserve to be safe, and so do the thousands who come here to work, to learn, and to take advantage of all the city has to offer,” Paul Fishman, New Jersey's chief federal prosecutor, said in a statement. “They also need to know the police protecting them are doing that important – and often dangerous – work while respecting their constitutional rights."
The official announcment is expected at noon in Newark. It was not immediately clear who would serve as the city's court-appointed watchdog or whether one had been chosen. A spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office in Newark declined to answer questions before the announcment.
The federal investigation detailed longstanding and institutional misconduct, including retaliatory arrests "for behavior perceived as insubordinate or disrespectful to officers," according to the documents. Officers also routinely stole from suspects, the investigation found.
The investigation found that 20% of the city's officers reported uses of force that were either unconstitutional or unnecessary, while internal affairs inquiries into use-of-force incidents were often lacking.
The department received 989 excessive-force complaints against officers from 2000 to 2009, according to records reviewed by The Times.
Only 21 of those cases, just 2%, resulted in disciplinary action or criminal charges against the officers. Nationwide, policing experts say, an average of 9% of all excessive-force complaints against officers are sustained.
Udi Ofer, executive director of the New Jersey chapter of the ACLU, told The Times that the report's findings could mark a historic moment for Newark.
“They are saying that potentially up to 75% of stops are unconstitutional. That’s huge. That is just widespread 4th Amendment abuses," Ofer said. “These are serious findings that are going to need dramatic reforms. Now Newark will be put to the test in how it will respond to these findings.”
Newark's administration, including freshman Mayor Ras Baraka, has agreed to court-appointed monitoring of the police department, according to the statement from the U.S. attorney's office.
The federal report calls for improved internal affairs practices and use-of-force reporting, external review -- which could include creation of a Civilian Complaint Review Board -- and "improved data collection" regarding the department's pedestrian stop practices.
Newark, a city of roughly 250,000 which sits just 15 miles outside of New York City, has been a haven for drug and gang violence for years, patrolled by a department whose ranks were slashed by municipal budget cuts in 2010.
The city saw 111 homicides in 2013, its bloodiest year since 1990. Newark has long struggled with poverty and high unemployment, and the city's residents and police have had a lukewarm relationship since 1967, when a series of race riots left dozens dead.
“We certainly hope that Newark will use this opportunity to create a police force that is respectful of civil rights and that is accountable to the people of Newark," Ofer said. "Newark is facing an opportunity that only comes once every few generations to establish meaningful reforms of the police department.”
The federal government has taken over a number of city police departments since it began launching "pattern or practice" investigations into civil rights violations in the 1990s. The Los Angeles Police Department was placed under a monitor from 2001 to 2013 in the wake of the Rodney King beating and the Rampart Division scandal, and the New Orleans and Albuquerque police departments are currently under federal watch.
Newark is the second police department in New Jersey's history to receive a federal watchdog. The New Jersey State Police were the subject of a federal investigation after a racial-profiling scandal in 1999, and they remained under a court-appointed monitor for roughly a decade.
Follow @JamesQueallyLAT for breaking news
And mistakes will be made in the future and more innocent people will be executed.
Ray Krone, is the poster boy for the death penalty in the USA and world. Ray Krone was framed by the Phoenix Police for murder. Ray Krone's claim to fame is that he was the 100th person DNA testing proved was framed by the police for murder.
This guy sounds like a real *sshole who deserves to be executed by the government. Of course the government makes everybody they execute sound like real *sshole.
When you read the government's side of Ray Krone's story he sounds like a real *sshole. The only problem was Ray Krone was innocent.
High court clears Ariz. to execute inmate today
Drug ruling clears way for Arizona to execute Joseph Wood
Michael Kiefer, The Republic | azcentral.com 7:26 a.m. MST July 23, 2014
The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld Arizona's veil of secrecy around its lethal-injection drugs and will allow the execution of a double-murderer to proceed at 10 a.m. today.
The ruling knocked down a federal appeals court decision that the execution could not move forward unless the state turned over information about how the execution would be carried out.
Executions are public events. But in recent years, many states that still have capital punishment, including Arizona, have passed or expanded laws that shroud the procedures in secrecy.
Joseph Rudolph Wood, 55, killed two people in 1989. He is scheduled to be put to death today at the state prison in Florence.
The Arizona Department of Corrections plans to use a controversial drug, and it favors a controversial method of administering it, so Wood's attorneys demanded to know the qualifications of the executioners and the origin of the drugs to be used in the execution, claiming that Wood had a First Amendment right to the information.
On Saturday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed.
The state appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which lifted the stay without addressing the First Amendment issue.
State officials said in court filings that they need to maintain secrecy because publicity has made it more difficult to obtain the drugs needed to carry out executions.
Drug manufacturers have begun refusing to sell to departments of corrections, forcing the departments to experiment with new and less reliable drugs or to specially order them from compounding pharmacies, which in turn are harassed by anti-death-penalty activists.
"Prisoners who are sentenced to death for their crimes have every right to know what drugs are going to be used," said Stephanie Grisham, a spokeswoman for Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne, "but it would be a bad matter of policy if the manufacturer of these drugs were identified. The very reason we have a new drug protocol is because of the pressure and threats applied to the companies ... forcing them to stop making it."
It was not the first time the Supreme Court has ruled against a stay of execution based on drug secrecy. In 2010, it ruled against an Arizona prisoner asserting his right to know about lethal-injection drugs that turned out to have been improperly obtained from overseas.
The U.S. District and Circuit Courts in Washington, D.C., later determined federal law had been violated, which the Arizona Attorney General's Office denies.
"In most respects, what Mr. Wood is asking for is quite small," said Megan McCracken, a former federal defender who works with the University of California-Berkeley Death Penalty Clinic. "I think they don't want to set precedent about giving out information, and they don't want to come under scrutiny."
Murder in Tucson
Wood was born in Texas in 1958 and grew up mostly in Missouri and Tucson.
He spent six years in the U.S. Air Force, but mustered out with serious alcohol and emotional problems that may have been exacerbated by a series of head injuries from car and motorcycle accidents.
In 1989, he was living with Debra Dietz, who supported him and paid for the apartment they shared.
But Wood was abusive, and when Dietz moved out, he began stalking her.
On Aug. 7, 1989, Wood became enraged when Dietz wouldn't take his calls.
He went to the auto body shop where Dietz worked for her father, Eugene.
Eugene Dietz was on the phone when Wood entered. Wood waited for him to hang up and then shot him in the chest without a word.
Wood then hunted down Debra Dietz and shot her twice.
He was sentenced to death twice and lived quietly on death row in Florence until his appeals ran out.
Shroud of secrecy
According to McCracken, at least 11 states shield information about executions.
Arizona's law protects the identity of executioners, which the state interprets to extend to the drug suppliers as well.
From the time execution by lethal injection was instituted in 1977 until 2010, executions were carried out with a sequence of drugs beginning with the anesthetic thiopental.
But then supplies of thiopental ran out because it was being replaced by newer drugs in clinical settings. In 2010, with the impending execution of Jeffrey Landrigan, The Arizona Republic reported that the state had obtained its thiopental from England, sidestepping rules of the U.S. Food and Drug and Drug Enforcement administrations.
Laws of the European Union prohibit assisting in capital punishment anywhere in the world, so the United Kingdom and Italy shut down exports of drugs that could be used for lethal injection, forcing states to switch to the barbiturate pentobarbital.
But that drug became unavailable when manufacturers decided they did not want lifesaving drugs they had developed to be used to end lives.
Florida, Ohio and Oklahoma switched to protocols using combinations of midazolam, a drug similar to Valium. Arizona opted for a combination of midazolam and the opiate hydromorphone. But midazolam has proven to be less reliable than thiopental or pentobarbital for lethal injection.
Last October, a Florida man was executed with a three-drug protocol starting with midazolam. The Associated Press reported that the prisoner "remained conscious longer and made more body movements after losing consciousness than other people executed recently by lethal injection under the old formula."
In January, an Ohio prisoner who received a cocktail of midazolam and hydromorphone gasped for air and took more than 20 minutes to die, compared withthe usual 10 minutes or so when prisoners are executed with thiopental or pentobarbital.
And during an April execution in Oklahoma, the condemned man at first appeared to be unconscious, but then began "writhing and bucking," one eyewitness wrote.
He kicked his legs and tried to sit up while muttering words the witnesses couldn't understand.
The execution was stopped, but the man subsequently died of an apparent heart attack.
Human error, not midazolam was blamed — the doctor who inserted the catheter into the prisoner's groin area went completely through the femoral artery into the surrounding tissues.
In most states, the drugs used in lethal injection are administered through a simple IV tube in a hand or arm. Arizona executions are supposed to be performed in that manner, unless the medical team has trouble accessing a suitable vein.
Nine of the last 13 Arizona executions have been performed with a catheter surgically cut into the femoral artery.
The Federal Public Defender's Office in Phoenix, the agency that generally handles the last appeals of death-row prisoners, has sued the state repeatedly over the use of central-line catheters.
Continuing issue
In their motions for a stay of execution, Wood's attorneys cited a long history of transparency about executions, from the display of ropes used in hangings to information about the gas chamber that still sits across the viewing room from the lethal-injection chamber in the death house at the Florence prison.
In recent years, the federal defender's office has been battling the state over secrecy.
"The people of Arizona have decided that the death penalty is an appropriate punishment," said Dale Baich, a federal public defender. "They should equally decide that the death penalty cannot remain shrouded in secrecy that prevents ... the public, the courts and the condemned from knowing if executions are carried out in compliance with all state and federal laws," Baich said.
The argument will continue in U.S. District Court in an ongoing lawsuit.
But Wood will no longer be part of the argument.
Vets rally in Phoenix for terminated UA researcher
Sophia Kunthara, The Republic | azcentral.com 7:06 p.m. MST July 22, 2014
Veterans who support research into the use of marijuana to treat post-traumatic stress disorder came together with other advocates at a medical campus in downtown Phoenix on Tuesday afternoon to protest the departure of a leading researcher in the field.
Dr. Sue Sisley had received approval from the Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. Public Health Service, along with conditional approval from the University of Arizona Institution Review Board, to study the effects of marijuana on PTSD before she was let go by the university late last month.
Sisley said that, without explanation, UA officials told her they would not renew her appointment to three positions at the state school in Tucson.
Chris Sigurdson, a UA spokesman, said the university could not discuss why Sisley's appointments were not renewed. He said the university would like to continue research into marijuana as a treatment for PTSD on the school's Tucson campus, not its College of Medicine's Phoenix campus, where a small group protested the decision on Tuesday afternoon.
Sigurdson said the Tucson campus provides a teaching hospital, two veteran centers and clinical facilities for storage of controlled substances.
He said the university will nominate a new principal investigator to the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, the nonprofit research and educational organization through which Sisley was to conduct the research.
Sigurdson said political pressure did not play a role in halting Sisley's research and that the university has supported research into medical marijuana in the past.
Sisley said despite not being renewed, she is determined to continue her research.
"We will persevere until this research finds a proper home," Sisley said.
Sisley said she wants to have the research done for the sake of the veterans, to whom she said she has a "deep sense of obligation." Twenty-two veterans died from suicide every day in 2010, according to a suicide-data report made public by the Department of Veterans Affairs in February 2013.
"I refuse to turn my back on these veterans," she said.
The halt in Sisley's research plans prompted about 30 supporters of her work to gather outside the College of Medicine on Tuesday. A Change.org petition has also garnered more than 62,000 signatures for her reinstatement.
Mark Steinmetz, the owner of Nature's AZ Medicine, the dispensary where Sisley is the director, said he was at the College of Medicine to support Sisley and her efforts to research the effects of marijuana on PTSD.
Steinmetz said many veterans come into his dispensaries with other qualifying conditions, but says the marijuana also helps their PTSD.
"We just want the truth to come out," Steinmetz said. "Is this an effective treatment for PTSD?"
The group made several statements about the benefits of medical marijuana for PTSD and the importance of more research before delivering letters to UA administrators, including president Ann Weaver Hart.
David Lucier, a veteran with PTSD and the president of the Arizona Veterans and Military Leadership Alliance, said the university's decision to not continue the research with Sisley as the leader hampers not only potential treatment for veterans, but academic freedom. Lucier said he would like to see the research continue so policies can fall into place based on the results.
"Let the science dictate the next step," he said.
Representatives from the Arizona Cannabis Nurses Association were also present the College of Medicine to show their support for Sisley. The association led the effort to have PTSD listed as a qualifying condition with the Arizona Department of Health for patients to access a medical marijuana card. The Health Department will consider PTSD to be a qualifying condition beginning Jan. 1.
"We as nurses are supporters of research," said Heather Manus, president of the nurse's association. "We think it's an injustice that she was not renewed with the university to continue her research."
Again government is the cause of the problem, not the solution to the problem.
9/11 panel: Terrorism fight in 'dangerous phase'
Kevin Johnson, USA Today 4:29 p.m. MST July 22, 2014
WASHINGTON -- The global struggle against terrorism has "entered a new and dangerous phase" with growing threats posed by foreign fighters returning from the civil war in Syria and the vulnerability of critical systems to cyber attack, the original authors of the 9/11 Commission report concluded in a new analysis.
Marking the 10th anniversary of the panel's landmark report, which identified an array of intelligence failures leading up to the 2001 terrorist attacks, panel chairman Tom Kean said Tuesday there was "broad agreement" on the new threats facing the nation and rest of the world.
The core leadership of al-Qaeda, which was responsible for launching the 9/11 assaults, has been dramatically weakened. Yet the panel concluded that "affiliated groups are gaining strength throughout the greater Middle East" and are operating in 16 countries.
"The country may be suffering from a waning sense of urgency," vice chairman Lee Hamilton said.
The commission's work effectively concluded after presenting its original findings to the White House and Congress in 2004. This year, the group reconvened as "private citizens" to offer an analysis of the national security landscape in the new report sponsored by the Bipartisan Policy Center.
Some of the group's most biting commentary was aimed at Congress, which panel member James Thompson, a former Illinois governor, called "embarrassing" for its deeply partisan political ways.
The new commission report found that Congress has "resisted" decade-old recommendations to streamline its oversight of the Department of Homeland Security, which now reports to 92 congressional committees and subcommittees, up from 88 in 2004.
"The Congress of the United States is failing us and failing us badly," Thompson said during a briefing.
Tim Roemer, a commissioner and former six-term Indiana congressman, said Congress is the "last branch (of government) that people are looking for to solve our problems."
House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, a speaker at Tuesday's briefing, mockingly thanked the commission for its "resounding endorsement" of the Congress. He then went on to outline a series of national security "challenges" that he believes represent the greatest threats.
He called the 2012 Boston Marathon bombings a "textbook case" for its involvement of two self-radicalized suspects who apparently operated on their own, making detection difficult for investigators.
"What you saw in Boston is the kind of threat you are going to see play out more," McCaul said.
Of the unauthorized disclosure of the government's secret surveillance programs, McCaul said former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, who leaked information about the programs to select journalists, did great damage to the country's security strategy.
"He's not a hero," McCaul said. "In my book, he's a traitor."
National Intelligence Director James Clapper, who also spoke to the group, said the existing threat landscape represented the "most diverse" in a career of more than 50 years.
"The recent world events show how complex the challenges are," he said.
Hey, screw that 4th Amendment thingy, the NSA goons need some good entertainment.
Snowden: NSA snoops shared intercepted sextings
John Bacon, USA TODAY 9:02 a.m. MST July 21, 2014
Former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden says the analysts who monitored the texts and e-mails of millions of Americans would sometimes share intercepted nude photos and sex texts with colleagues.
Snowden, in a lengthy interview with The Guardian published this weekend, said he and his colleagues sometimes doubted the ethics of what they were doing.
"Many of the people searching through the haystacks (of information) were young, enlisted guys, 18 to 22 years old," Snowden told the publication. "In the course of their daily work, they stumble across something that is completely unrelated in any sort of necessary sense – for example, an intimate nude photo of someone in a sexually compromising situation. But they're extremely attractive. So what do they do?
"They turn around in their chair and they show a co-worker. And their co-worker says, 'Oh, hey, that's great. Send that to Bill down the way,' and then Bill sends it to George, George sends it to Tom, and sooner or later this person's whole life has been seen by all of these other people."
Snowden told the Guardian that the analysts were comfortable sharing the information because they worked in small offices where everyone knew everyone else. "It's never reported, because the auditing of these systems is incredibly weak," he said. The proof of that, Snowden said, was his own situation.
"A 29-year-old walked in and out of the NSA with all of their private records," Snowden said. "What does that say about their auditing? They didn't even know."
But Snowden defended his colleagues, saying they were normal people, not "moustache-twirling villains." Those who objected to the NSA's snooping would not complain because they saw what previous whistle-blowers had to live with — "pulled out of the shower at gunpoint, naked, in front of their families."
"We all have mortgages," Snowden said. "We all have families."
Snowden, now 31, was a contractor for Booz Allen Hamilton when he leaked details of U.S. surveillance programs to The Guardian and The Washington Post. The first reports were published in June 2013, setting off an immediate global firestorm. Snowden, who was in hiding in Hong Kong at the time, fled to Moscow.
The Guardian and Post won the Pulitzer prize for public service for their coverage of Snowden. President Obama promised to scale back surveillance of American citizens. Last week, Germany ordered the CIA station chief out of the country.
Snowden has expressed interest in returning to the United States, but says he fears an unjust trial on charges of espionage and theft of government property could result in a lengthy prison sentence.
Remember every time your standing line at Frys or Safeway to buy food, that you and the 3 people standing next to you are paying for the purchases of the 5th person in line.
That's if your not one of the people on food stamps. In that case thank the two people in front of you, and the two people in back of you for buying your food for you.
Ain't Amerika great, we are now the worlds largest socialist police state.
Ariz. food-stamp, unemployment fraud add up to $2.1 mil
Mary Jo Pitzl, The Republic | azcentral.com 5:18 p.m. MST July 22, 2014
State welfare officials say they have identified $2.1 million in fraudulent food-stamp and unemployment benefits paid out during the past year.
The money, when it is recovered, goes back into the programs, said Clarence Carter, director of the Arizona Department of Economic Security.
The agency, working with the attorney general's office, local law enforcement and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, identified 87 food-stamp recipients who should not have received the benefit during the fiscal year that ended June 30. They are barred from applying to the program for a year. Four of them are banned for life, Carter said, citing the size of their fraud and the state's ability to show they intentionally scammed the system.
In all, the state expects to collect $1 million in overpayments and restitution.
Another $1.1 million should come from individuals who wrongly claimed unemployment-insurance benefits. The agency said 122 people were convicted for such fraud, with seven of them sentenced to jail and another 71 put on probation. In addition, many of the individuals were sentenced to community service, totaling 5,271 hours.
Carter said the agency has a number of ways of detecting fraud, and in the last two years has emphasized catching the problem before the benefit is distributed. He declined to detail the agency's tactics, but said DES has a "broad array of tools" that range from tracking transactions to acting on tips to reviewing law-enforcement databases.
It might take a while to collect the money, the agency said.
But I kind of like the judges statement because it makes the death penalty look like what it is, a barbaric inhumane form of justice that may be fitting for the Christian God, but something that shouldn't be done by the government.
Here is one statement from the judge:
Appeals court judge argues for return of firing squads
EJ Montini, columnist | azcentral.com 4:10 p.m. MST July 22, 2014
The chief judge of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has a suggestion to prevent legal challenges to lethal injection as a method of execution:
Bring back firing squads.
I am not making this up.
Chief Judge Alex Kozinski was upset with his court's decision this week to stay the execution of Arizona killer Joseph Rudolph Wood, who murdered his estranged girlfriend and her father in 1989.
A federal appeals court ruled Monday that Arizona cannot yet execute Wood, who argued that he had a First Amendment right to know detailed information about the drugs that would be used to kill him.
Late Tuesday the Supreme Court reversed the lower court ruling, lifting the stay.
Kozinski's dissent in the 9th Court ruling outlines why firing squads would prevent such legal wrangling.
He wrote in part:
"Whatever the hopes and reasons for the switch to drugs (for executions), they proved to be misguided. Subverting medicines meant to heal the human body to the opposite purpose was an enterprise doomed to failure. Today's case is only the latest in an unending effort to undermine and discredit this method of carrying out lawful executions…
"Whatever happens to Wood, the attacks will not stop and for a simple reason: The enterprise is flawed. Using drugs meant for individuals with medical needs to carry out executions is a misguided effort to mask the brutality of executions by making them look serene and peaceful—like something any one of us might experience in our final moments…
"But executions are, in fact, nothing like that. They are brutal, savage events, and nothing the state tries to do can mask that reality. Nor should it. If we as a society want to carry out executions, we should be willing to face the fact that the state is committing a horrendous brutality on our behalf…
"If some states and the federal government wish to continue carrying out the death penalty, they must turn away from this misguided path and return to more primitive—and foolproof—methods of execution. The guillotine is probably best but seems inconsistent with our national ethos. And the electric chair, hanging and the gas chamber are each subject to occasional mishaps.
"The firing squad strikes me as the most promising. Eight or ten large-caliber rifle bullets fired at close range can inflict massive damage, causing instant death every time. There are plenty of people employed by the state who can pull the trigger and have the training to aim true.
"The weapons and ammunition are bought by the state in massive quantities for law enforcement purposes, so it would be impossible to interdict the supply. And nobody can argue that the weapons are put to a purpose for which they were not intended: firearms have no purpose other than destroying their targets. Sure, firing squads can be messy, but if we are willing to carry out executions, we should not shield ourselves from the reality that we are shedding human blood. If we, as a society, cannot stomach the splatter from an execution carried out by firing squad, then we shouldn't be carrying out executions at all."
I love this guy.
And he's right.
Either we "stomach the spatter" or we abolish the brutally barbaric practice.
If I could vote in the election I would probably vote for Barry Hess, even if he isn't a "Real Libertarian" candidate.
But despite that from a Libertarian point of view he is better then any of the Democrats and Republicans.
Barry Hess seems to be Republican running as a Libertarian. He has a lot of positions that are inconsistent with the Libertarian NAP or NIFF principles.
NAP stands for Non Aggression Principle and NIFF stands for Non-Initiation of Force or Fraud.
Those two terms are pretty much the same and mean you can do anything you want as long as you don't initiate force or fraud against another person.
I was kind of pissed off when I took this quiz and it said Andrew Thomas is the guy I should vote for. Jesus, Andrew Thomas is probably the WORST OF ALL THE CANDIDATES FOR GOVERNOR.
The quiz was poorly done because it forced me to answer two questions, which for me had and answer of None of the Above.
And while we are talking about None of the Above, I think every election should be required to have a "None of the Above" on the ballot. If "None of the Above" wins the election, the office should go unfilled for the term of the office.
When I lived in Nevada, they actually had "none of the above on the ballot", but if "none of the above" won the election, the person who got the 2nd highest vote count would win the election.
Quiz: Which Arizona governor candidate should you vote for?
The Republic | azcentral.com 7:58 a.m. MST July 23, 2014
Which Arizona governor candidate most closely matches your views? Take this quiz and find out!
The US Supreme Court is a good example.
The US Supreme Court judges are appointed, but in recent history most of their decisions are 5-4 decisions, based not on what the Constitution says, but based on politics.
Appointed officials would have some advantages
Robert Robb, columnist | azcentral.com 3:11 p.m. MST July 21, 2014
Arizona was populist at birth and populism remains a powerful political influence today. One manifestation of that is that Arizona elects a raft of public officials who are appointed in other states. Several current public controversies wouldn't exist if we didn't.
The county treasurer is supposed to keep track of the money. There shouldn't be any political judgment involved. Yet we elected someone to do the job.
An appointed county treasurer would never create a job on the public dime for a political blunderbuss like Russell Pearce, as elected treasurer Charles "Hos" Hoskins has.
Worried about APS trying to influence the election of corporation commissioners? If they were appointed, you wouldn't. And if they were required to have technical expertise, you could have more confidence in their decisions.
Elections are supposed to provide accountability, but often they actually shield public officials from accountability for misdeeds.
An appointed state attorney general wouldn't be embroiled in campaign finance legal disputes, as Tom Horne is. And a credible accusation against an appointed attorney general of putting a mistress on the payroll would have been promptly investigated and the miscreant fired if validated.
An appointed superintendent of public instruction exposed as having a secret life as a vile anonymous political blogger would have been instantly sacked. John Huppenthal is running for re-election.
Appointed officials aren't immune from politics, but they are one step removed. And often, that is a valuable and useful step.
Reach Robb at robert.robb@arizonarepublic.com. Follow him on Twitter at @RJRobb
Arizona among worst in U.S. for alcohol-related deaths
Maybe you folks at Safer Arizona can get all these drunks to switch over to marijuana. As you guys say pot is much safer then booze.
Every year 6 million people die worldwide from the medical side effects of tobacco.
Every year 2.5 million people die worldwide from the medical side effects of alcohol.
Every year a whopping 0, that's a big ZERO people die worldwide from the medical side effects of smoking marijuana.
Police shoot man at north Tempe motel
The following statement from police is usually a code word meaning the man they murdered was unarmed and they are trying to figure out a lame excuse to justify the murder.
"Police believed the man had a firearm
and felt there was a threat"
Don't worry, I am NOT psychic. This stuff happens so often it's easy to predict.
Republican wants tax money for his businesses, not others
A lot of people call our elected officials in the US Congress and US Senate incompetent morons who are incapable of solving our problems.
I disagree with them, most elected officials are not incompetent morons, but rather very smart criminals who do very well at using their office to loot the government and give it to themselves and the special interest groups that helped get them into power.
Should officials keep fighting legalized pot?
AZ Talk: Should officials keep fighting legalized pot?
Looks like 3 out of the 4 people in this article support legalizing marijuana.
West Valley police get new DUI enforcement tools
Policing for $$$ REVENUE $$$ - That's what DUI task forces are all about!!!!!!
Getting a DUI ticket is a lot like going to the doctors. Some pig is waiting there with a needle to take your blood.
I find this an outrageous violation of our privacy and of our 4th Amendment rights.
The only good news is that Arizona's "implied consent law" which requires you to take a DUI test was ruled unconstitutional a few months back.
The bad news is to get around that, if a cop thinks you are drunk, he will get a judge to rubber stamp a bogus search warrant that allows him to forcefully take your blood if you refuse to voluntarily submit to a DUI test.
"Buckeye Police Department debuted its
DUI processing van in May, which allows
officers to do breathalyzer tests, draw
blood, take fingerprint scans and apply
for search warrants"
That search warrant is to forcefully take your blood if you refuse to consent to a breath test.
Last but not least these DUI busts are mostly about raising revenue for the government and have next to nothing to do with safety.
With Only 4 Major Types of Warship Left, Can the U.S. Navy Still Dominate the Seas?
With Only 4 Major Types of Warship Left, Can the U.S. Navy Still Dominate the Seas?
Sounds like an article put out by the US Military Office of Propaganda.
Last time I checked the American Empire spent more on our military forces then ALL the other governments of the world combined. And that's been true for years and years.
Phoenix's attempt to curb puppy mills challenged
I suspect the royal rulers of Phoenix voted for this law which is probably unconstitutional to get the votes of animal lovers.
Sadly that's what government is all about - "special interest groups".
Legalize drugs and halt organized drug crime
Legalize drugs and halt organized drug crime
While I don't agree with Ross Smith 100 percent he certainly is right about most of what he says.
Personally I think ALL drugs should be re-legalized, just like they were before 1914 at the Federal level.
There's more to legalizing pot than just boosting tax revenue
Remember kiddies, marijuana is addictive just like heroin and cigarettes. Well at least that the line of BS Diana Dellis wants you to believe.
And NO, this letter to the editor didn't come out of the National Inquirer or the Onion, it was published in the Arizona Republic.
Chandler schools use override funds to boost security
Chandler schools use override funds to boost security
Translation - We need more money to turn our schools into bigger prisons then they already are!!!!
Pearce hypocrisy shines in new government job
Rob Mariani thinks Russell Pearce is a jerk??? If he does, he is probably right!!!!
Sign spinners shouldn't be out in the day's heat
Mary Scott sounds like one of those "do gooders" who thinks she knows how to run everybody else's lives better then they do.
I suspect people like Mary Scott are the same "do gooders" who want to put people in prison for victimless crimes like smoking pot, prostitution, gambling and not going to church on Sunday.
You know Mary Scott if you think working in the hot sun sucks, then maybe you shouldn't work in the hot sun. But please shut the f*ck up and let all the other people who want to work in the hot sun do it.
ATF drug stings targeted minorities
I believe I have posted articles on this before maybe a year ago.
What the cops do is create an imaginary plan to rob an imaginary drug stash house. Then they offer some sucker $100,000 in loot from the imaginary robber, if the suckers offers to participate in the robbery.
When they find a sucker, they give him a gun so he can participate in the robber and then arrest the sucker.
I attached a second article with the plans for one of these drug house robberies that exist only in the minds of the cops who create them.
ATF Arming Robbers in Hatched Plots
Source
6 questions about the IRS’s missing emails
What??? Did dog didn't eat those IRS hard drives and all the back up tapes???
D.C. man exonerated in 1982 rape and murder
D.C. man exonerated in 1982 rape and murder; DNA reveals FBI error in conviction
So you think your going to get a fair trial??? Don't make me laugh!!!!!
Kevin Martin’s case marks the fifth time in
as many years that federal prosecutors in
D.C. acknowledged that errors by an elite
FBI forensic unit have led to a wrongful
conviction.
Currently over 300 people have been released from prison when DNA tests proved they were framed by the police for murder and other crimes.
Here in Arizona, Ray Krone is the poster boy of DNA testing. Ray Krone was framed by the Phoenix Police for murder and was released from prison when he became the 100th person to be freed by DNA test. If Ray Krone had been number 99 or number 101, nobody would care about him.
Gilbert church receives a sign from (close to) heaven
Even if I am an atheist I think churches should have the same free speech rights as everybody else.
3 teens accused of killing 2 homeless men
Source
3 teens accused of killing 2 homeless men
Source
Newark police to get federal monitor after civil rights violations
"The investigation found that city police
officers had no constitutional basis for
75% of the pedestrian stops they conducted
in recent years"
Source
High court clears Ariz. to execute inmate today
Personally I am against the death penalty. Mistakes have been made in the past, and innocent people have been executed.
Vets rally in Phoenix for terminated UA researcher
Source
Terrorism fight in 'dangerous phase'
If the American government would stop it's meddling in the Middle East and it's meddling in the affairs of other foreign government these problems would disappear overnight.
NSA snoops shared intercepted sextings
Think of YOUR SEX LIFE as a SOAP OPERA for the amusement of the NSA goons that spy on us.
Ariz. food-stamp, unemployment fraud add up to $2.1 mil
Considering that 1 out of every 5 Americans get food stamps this $2.1 million fraud ain't jacksh*t!!!!
Bring back firing squads???
I am against the death penalty, because mistakes will be made and innocent people will be executed. And of course mistakes have been made and innocent people have been executed.
"Using drugs meant for individuals with
medical needs to carry out executions
is a misguided effort to mask the
brutality of executions by making them
look serene and peaceful—like something
any one of us might experience in our
final moments"
For those of you who don't like my statement about the Christian God, it's time for you to get your Bibles out and do some reading. The Christian God loves to murder people that p*ss him off in barbaric inhumane ways. You can find lots of that in the Old Testament.
Which Arizona governor candidate should you vote for?
Appointed officials would have some advantages
Robert Robb is right in a lot of ways, but he is also wrong in a lot of ways.
Matt Papke is against the insane, unconstitutional War on Drugs
Here is his response to my question about the "War on Drugs"
Re: Whats your position on the "War on Drugs"matt@freetempe.com
Jul 21
First there is no constitutional authority 2 ban substances.
The war on drugs has created more problems then is solved. No knock warrants or raids create hazardous situations for all involved. Additionally they seem to be in violation of our Fourth Amendment protections.
Aside from a lack of constitutional authority government should not regulate morality. Placing someone in a cage for using something that comes from the earth makes no sense to me.
The war on drugs the war on drugs continues to increase in dark continues to increase in both monetary and personal costs. Families are torn apart as nonviolent drug offenders enter Violent institutions.
Drug abuse is a medical disorder we would be better served to treat it as such.
Hope that helps please let me know if any questions.
I have stated my position publicly many times
Matt Papke
This is the letter I sent him
Dear Matt Papke:I have seen your signs and website, but none of them seem to address your position on the "War on Drugs".
What's your position on the "War on Drugs"???
Are you a big fan of the "War on Drugs" and will have Tempe expand the "War on Drugs" if you are elected?
Do you think the "War on Drugs" is working just fine and will continue it with out making any major changes???
Do you think the "War on Drugs" is a dismal failure and needs to be ended?
Thanks
10 new Arizona laws that will affect residents
Translation - Now the government can use the DUI laws to shake down boaters for money like they currently shake down automobile drivers - Also flushes the 5th Amendment down the toilet - "Boating: Creates a civil penalty for boaters operating a motorized watercraft who refuse to submit to a drug or alcohol test."Translation - The religious zealots in Arizona government continue their war on women - "Abortions: Makes it a misdemeanor to help a minor get an abortion in violation of parental-consent regulations; eliminates a requirement that the state Department of Health Services first get a warrant to conduct an unannounced inspection of an abortion clinic during business hours if there is reasonable cause to believe it is violating licensing requirements"
Translation - Flushes the 1st Amendment down the toilet. I suspect CPS will also use this law to steal children from their parents, when the parents take nude photos of the kiddies - "Nude photos: It is a felony to display or distribute a photo or video of another person in a state of nudity or engaged in specific sexual activities if the subject has not consented to the disclosure"
10 new Arizona laws that will affect residents
Arizona Republic columnists EJ Montini and Laurie Roberts discuss new laws in Arizona.
Alia Beard Rau, The Republic | azcentral.com 1:31 p.m. MST July 23, 2014
The Arizona Legislature passed and Gov. Jan Brewer signed 278 new laws this year. Most of them go into effect Thursday.
The majority of the new laws will have little day-to-day impact on the public, instead addressing state-budget issues, specific industries or regulating state agencies. Here are 10 new laws the public may want to take note of:
Boating: Creates a civil penalty for boaters operating a motorized watercraft who refuse to submit to a drug or alcohol test.
Abortions: Makes it a misdemeanor to help a minor get an abortion in violation of parental-consent regulations; eliminates a requirement that the state Department of Health Services first get a warrant to conduct an unannounced inspection of an abortion clinic during business hours if there is reasonable cause to believe it is violating licensing requirements.
Golf carts: Allows a golf cart or neighborhood electric vehicle to be driven on the roads or along the paved shoulder of a road in age-restricted communities in Maricopa County.
Carrying guns: Residents currently in the military or who have been honorably discharged from the military can qualify for a concealed-weapons permit starting at age 19 instead of 21.
Shooting guns: Counties may no longer prohibit or restrict the legal firing of a gun or use of archery equipment on private property.
Laser pointers: It is now a misdemeanor to knowingly aim a laser pointer at an occupied aircraft. The crime is considered assault if the act renders the pilot unable to safely fly the plane or causes serious injury to anyone on board.
Space flight: Limits a company's liability if a participant signs a liability release agreement and is injured or killed during a space flight.
Nude photos: It is a felony to display or distribute a photo or video of another person in a state of nudity or engaged in specific sexual activities if the subject has not consented to the disclosure.
Lost elderly: The Department of Safety will establish a silver alert notification system, which will issue alerts when a person age 65 or older vanishes under certain circumstances.
Growlers: Microbrewers can now sell growlers made of stainless steel, ceramic or non-porous plastic, in addition to glass.
Wallace of Wallace and Ladmo dies
Wallace of Wallace and Ladmo has kicked the bucket and dies according to this article.
Wallace's real name was Bill Thompson.
The Wallace and Ladmo Show was mostly Ladmo aka Ladimir Kwiatkowski and Pat McMahon who played a number of characters including Gerald, Captain Super and a number of other characters.
Why I won't give money to Phoenix NORML
Here is a blurb on why I have never become a dues paying member of Phoenix NORML.Personally I want to end the "War on Drugs" and re-legalize ALL drugs, so I support Phoenix NORML 100 percent in their effort to re-legalize marijuana.
But, I don't think Phoenix NORML is being run very well and for that reason I chose not to give my hard earned money to Phoenix NORML.
Why I won't give money to Phoenix NORML
Here is a blurb on why I have never become a dues paying member of Phoenix NORML.Personally I want to end the "War on Drugs" and re-legalize ALL drugs, so I support Phoenix NORML 100 percent in their effort to re-legalize marijuana.
But, I don't think Phoenix NORML is being run very well and for that reason I chose not to give my hard earned money to Phoenix NORML.
Why I am not a dues paying member of Phoenix NORML
Here is a blurb on why I have never become a dues paying member of Phoenix NORML.Personally I want to end the "War on Drugs" and re-legalize ALL drugs, so I support Phoenix NORML 100 percent in their effort to re-legalize marijuana.
But, I don't think Phoenix NORML is being run very well and for that reason I chose not to give my hard earned money to Phoenix NORML.
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