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This page contains an archive of the last 100 entries posted to ProgressNow.org Daily News Digest in the Crime and Penal Reform category. They are listed from newest to oldest. You can find older entries using the search box below.

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Crime and Penal Reform Archives

February 29, 2008

U.S. Imprisons One in 100 Adults, Report Finds - New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/29/us/29prison.html?ref=washington...
For the first time in the nation’s history, more than one in 100 American adults are behind bars, according to a new report. Nationwide, the prison population grew by 25,000 last year, bringing it to almost 1.6 million, after three decades of growth that has seen the prison population nearly triple. Another 723,000 people are in local jails. The number of American adults is about 230 million, meaning that one in every 99.1 adults is behind bars. Incarceration rates are even higher for some groups. One in 36 adult Hispanic men is behind bars, based on Justice Department figures for 2006. One in 15 adult black men is, too, as is one in nine black men ages 20 to 34. The report, from the Pew Center on the States, also found that one in 355 white women ages 35 to 39 is behind bars, compared with one in 100 black women.
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New High In U.S. Prison Numbers - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/28/AR2008022801704....
More than one in 100 adults in the United States is in jail or prison, an all-time high that is costing state governments nearly $50 billion a year and the federal government $5 billion more, according to a report released yesterday. With more than 2.3 million people behind bars, the United States leads the world in both the number and percentage of residents it incarcerates, leaving far-more-populous China a distant second, according to a study by the nonpartisan Pew Center on the States. The growth in prison population is largely because of tougher state and federal sentencing imposed since the mid-1980s. Minorities have been particularly affected: One in nine black men ages 20 to 34 is behind bars. For black women ages 35 to 39, the figure is one in 100, compared with one in 355 for white women in the same age group.
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February 28, 2008

Do you have a legal right to own a gun? - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2008-02-26-guns-cover_N.htm...
Guns, and questions about how much power the government has to keep people from owning them, are at the core of one of the most divisive topics in American politics. Nowhere is that divide more pronounced than in the gap between Americans' beliefs about their rights under the Second Amendment, and how courts have interpreted the law. Nearly three out of four Americans — 73% — believe the Second Amendment spells out an individual right to own a firearm, according to a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll of 1,016 adults taken Feb. 8-10. Yet for decades, federal judges have seen the Constitution differently, allowing a range of gun-control measures imposed by governments seeking to curb gun violence. Lower court judges overwhelmingly have ruled that the right "to keep and bear arms" isn't for individuals, but instead applies to state militias, such as National Guard units. The U.S. Supreme Court repeatedly declined to hear appeals of those rulings, fueling the debate over gun control and tension between the law and public opinion.
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Second Fla. inmate claims deputies dumped him - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-02-28-wheelchair-dumping_N.htm...
Another paralyzed inmate claims deputies tipped him out of his wheelchair onto a Tampa jailhouse floor, just weeks after video of a similar dumping at the same facility prompted a firestorm of criticism. Attorney John Trevena said the incident involving his client, Benjamin Rayburn, 32, who is serving a 10-year prison sentence, also was captured on videotape. "There is widespread abuse of inmates," Trevena said. "It's not limited to Hillsborough County Jail. It's just that the Hillsborough County Jail maintains very detailed video archives inside the jail."
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February 26, 2008

Trial begins for N.Y. officers who shot man 50 times - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-nypd26feb26,1,4643040.story...
On the steps of the courthouse, a man handed out buttons emblazoned with a bullet wound and a number. Protesters waved placards carrying the same number and counted in unison until they reached the figure at the heart of this case: 50. That is how many bullets undercover police officers fired at Sean Bell, killing the unarmed 23-year-old after his bachelor party at a Queens nightclub in November 2006. Two of the officers involved in the shooting went on trial for manslaughter Monday. Michael Oliver, who fired 31 times, and Gescard F. Isnora, who fired 11 shots, are accused of first- and second-degree manslaughter. If convicted, they could serve up to 25 years in prison. A third officer, Marc Cooper, is being tried separately for reckless endangerment. Two officers who fired three shots or fewer were not indicted. Angry observers said the shooting was a familiar New York story of police brutality against blacks. But the prosecutor of the two police officers called it bad police work, and a crime.
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Students Return to an Altered Campus After Shootings - New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/26/us/26campus.html?ref=us...
Under a hard, gray sleet, students at Northern Illinois University trudged back to class on Monday for the first time since a gunman burst into a lecture hall on Feb. 14 and killed five students and himself. Some students said they felt relieved to return to their routine of classes, calculus homework and television soap operas at the student center. Others said they felt newly shaken, on edge as they sat in big lecture halls and newly watchful of everyone around them, especially anyone who arrived in class after it had begun. In the array of reactions to the reopening of this public university, home to 25,000 students in a rural county 65 miles west of Chicago, nearly everyone, even university officials, was left wondering what the lasting scars will be.
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February 25, 2008

ATF nominee in the crossfire - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-atf25feb25,1,4119857.story...
With a new Senate power, GOP gun-rights advocates stall on Michael J. Sullivan's confirmation. They're protesting the bureau's strict enforcement of record-keeping rules for gun dealers.
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February 22, 2008

Crack Offenders Set for Release Mostly Nonviolent, Study Says - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/21/AR2008022102692....
Most of the more than 1,500 crack cocaine offenders who are immediately eligible to petition courts to be released from federal prisons under new guidelines issued by the U.S. Sentencing Commission are small-time dealers or addicts who are not career criminals and whose charges did not involve violence or firearms, according to a new analysis by the commission staff. About 6 percent of the inmates were supervisors or leaders of drug rings, and about 5 percent were convicted of obstructing justice, generally by trying to get rid of their drugs as they were being arrested or contacting witnesses or co-defendants before trial, according to the analysis being circulated on Capitol Hill by the commission to counter Bush administration assertions that the guidelines would prompt the release of thousands of dangerous criminals. About one-quarter of these inmates were given enhanced sentences because of weapons charges, though the charge can apply to defendants who were actually not carrying a gun or a knife but were with someone who was armed. About 18 percent of the offenders' sentences were reduced because they were arrested and charged for the first time, were forced into a drug ring by someone such as a boyfriend, were unwittingly caught up in a drug operation during a police raid, or for some other reason. The largest group -- 41 percent -- consists of small-time crack offenders who do not fall under any of the criteria that would cause authorities to increase their sentences or have them reduced.
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February 21, 2008

Justices Rule on Retroactivity of Decisions - New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/21/washington/21scotus.html?ref=washington...
In a new pro-defendant twist on federalism, the Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday that state courts are free to give criminal defendants the benefit of new constitutional developments, even when federal courts would be foreclosed from doing so. Over the dissent of Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who warned that the decision undermined “our role under the Constitution as the final arbiter of federal law,” the court ruled in favor of a Minnesota man convicted of sexually abusing a child in 1996. Years after his conviction had become final on appeal, the man, Stephen Danforth, went back to state court seeking the benefit of a 2004 Supreme Court decision that enhanced the right of defendants to confront their accusers in open court. The six-year-old victim had not appeared at the trial, instead giving a videotaped interview. Under Supreme Court precedent, state criminal defendants whose convictions are final may generally not avail themselves of “new rules” by petitioning for habeas corpus in federal court on the basis of a favorable new Supreme Court decision. The question for the court in this case was whether state courts, in considering postconviction appeals from criminal defendants, are bound by the same rule of nonretroactivity.
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States consider gun-access laws - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-02-20-gunlaws_N.htm...
Some companies in several states could be barred from telling their employees to keep their guns at home if lawmakers prevail in a battle that pits gun rights advocates against private businesses. While no state allows workers to carry weapons into the workplace, at least six states — Alaska, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Mississippi and Oklahoma — have enacted legislation prohibiting some employers from barring their workers from leaving guns locked in their cars in employee parking lots. Now, several more states are considering such laws. Supporters say licensed gun owners should have access to their weapons in case they need them for self-defense on the trek to and from home. If employers can ban guns from workers' cars, "it would be a wrecking ball to the Second Amendment," which governs the right to bear arms, says Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president of the National Rifle Association (NRA). Many business organizations and gun-control advocates argue, however, that such laws clash with employers' responsibility to maintain safe workplaces and their right to determine what to allow on their private property.
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February 20, 2008

Justices Will Hear Case on Evidence Suppression - New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/20/us/20scotus.html?ref=washington...
In theory, a criminal-law doctrine known as the exclusionary rule forbids prosecutors from using evidence obtained by the police as the result of an improper search. In practice, the rule has significant exceptions, like for evidence obtained in good faith through reliance on an invalid search warrant or as the result of erroneous information from a court official. Justices on the current Supreme Court have made no secret of their desire to carve more exceptions out of the nearly 100-year-old exclusionary rule. On Tuesday, the court accepted a new case that could provide a route toward that goal. The question in the case is whether the list of exceptions should be expanded to include evidence obtained from a search undertaken by officers relying on a careless record-keeping error by the police.
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Supreme Court to review 'exclusionary rule' on evidence - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-evidence20feb20,1,494682.st...
The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to reconsider the reach of the "exclusionary rule," a doctrine that has been controversial since the 1960s because it requires judges to throw out evidence if it was obtained improperly by the police. Several of the court's conservatives, including Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justice Antonin Scalia, have signaled they would like to rein in this rule. Every day, police officers stop cars or make arrests by relying on information in the files or on the computers of a police department. On occasion, the information is outdated or inaccurate. What should be done, then, if the officer finds drugs or guns in a stopped car, only to learn later that he relied on faulty information when he stopped the vehicle? Judges have been divided on that question. Some have said the evidence is tainted and should be suppressed. Others have said the evidence should be used if the officer was not to blame for the error.
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February 19, 2008

DNA tests fuel urgency to free the innocent - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-02-18-dna_N.htm...
After spending nearly 27 years buried in the vast Texas prison system for a crime he did not commit, Charles Chatman's first weeks of freedom have been overwhelming. Each of the six rooms in his new apartment, including the bathroom, is larger than any of his previous cells. The gleaming entertainment system and sleek laptop from family, friends and attorneys might as well be hollow props on a movie set, because Chatman, 47, has little idea how to operate them — testimony to more than a generation lost behind bars. Chatman was exonerated last month by DNA testing while serving a 99-year sentence for sexual assault. His release Jan. 3 marked the 15th such exoneration in Dallas County during the past five years, the most of any county in the nation. Aside from New York and Illinois, Dallas County also has produced more exonerations than any state. As DNA technology and investigations identify a mounting number of wrongful convictions, the urgency to find others like Chatman is increasing. From Virginia to California, local prosecutors, law students and defense attorneys are combing through hundreds of thousands of old files in search of flawed convictions.
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1976 Law Is Just One in D.C.'s Maze Of Gun Rules - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/18/AR2008021802123....
In a city with one of the strictest gun control laws in the nation, perhaps no one understands the controversial statute in more detail than D.C. police Lt. Jon Shelton. As the officer in charge of firearms registration, he is the answer man. Ask what makes a rifle legal or illegal, and he'll talk about muzzle lengths, ammunition capacity and the difference between bolt action and semiautomatic. What types of handguns are security guards permitted to carry? Shelton can cite a half-dozen local and federal laws and regulations, quoting them from memory, and explain why some guards are allowed more firepower than others, depending on whom they work for. So, simple question: As the city prepares to defend its 1976 gun law before the U.S. Supreme Court next month, seeking to overturn a lower court ruling that declared the tough restrictions unconstitutional, how many people in the District legally own handguns, rifles or shotguns? Shelton paused. He grinned. He shook his head. "That we don't know."
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February 18, 2008

Illinois College Applied Lessons From Massacre At Virginia Tech - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/15/AR2008021500866....
If there were lessons learned after the Virginia Tech massacre, they were: Lock down and notify. Virginia Tech officials did neither until hours after the first shots sounded across the Blacksburg campus in April. Northern Illinois University did not make the same mistake Thursday.
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New York 'Crack Tax' Proposal Is Derided - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/16/AR2008021602198....
If you can't beat it, tax it. That seems to be the axiom in New York these days, where Gov. Eliot L. Spitzer (D), struggling to close a $4.4 billion budget gap, has proposed making drug dealers pay tax on their stashes of illegal drugs. The new tax would apply to cocaine, heroin and marijuana, and could be paid with pre-bought "tax stamps" affixed to the bags of dope. Some critics in the legislature are asking what the governor has been smoking. "I guess if it moves, he'll tax it," said Republican state Sen. Martin J. Golden, who dubbed the proposal "the crack tax." Some opponents said that because cocaine and weed would be subject to the new levies, it should more aptly be called "the crack-pot tax." "How do I explain to my 16-year-old son that we're giving a certain legitimacy to marijuana, cocaine and heroin?" asked Golden, a former New York City police officer who represents a Brooklyn district. "We are taxing an illegal substance." He added, "Is prostitution next?" On the other side of the aisle, some Democrats, too, were stunned by the plan. "My initial instinct is: I don't understand it," said Bill Perkins, a state senator from Harlem.
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Man convicted in '92 murder freed by DNA evidence -- chicagotribune.com

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-exonerate_satwebfeb16,1,68840...
A man sentenced to death in Mississippi for the rape-murder of a 3-year-old girl has been exonerated in the first case in the state where post-conviction DNA tests proved an inmate's innocence. A second man was granted a new trial and released on his own recognizance after his conviction for the murder of another 3-year-old girl was undermined by another man's alleged confession. The developments Friday in the closely connected cases took place in the courthouse in Macon, Miss., where the judge vacated the murder conviction of Kennedy Brewer, who spent some 7 years on Death Row, and granted a new trial to Levon Brooks, who was sentenced to life in prison.
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February 15, 2008

Push to permit guns on campus - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-02-14-guns-shooting_N.htm...
Even before a gunman killed six people and injured several others in a lecture hall at Northern Illinois University, a small but growing movement had been underway at universities and state legislatures to allow students, faculty and staff to carry guns on campus. Twelve states are considering bills that would allow people with concealed-weapons permits to carry guns at public universities. The efforts were sparked by the Virginia Tech massacre last April. Students for Concealed Carry on Campus, an Internet-based organization with 11,000 members in its Facebook group, is calling attention to the issue with a protest from April 21 to 25, a week after the one-year anniversary of the shootings at Virginia Tech on April 16.
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Gunman at Illinois College Kills 5 Students, Wounds 16 - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/14/AR2008021402647....
Without saying a word, a gunman dressed in black opened fire in a Northern Illinois University geology class Thursday, killing five students and wounding 16. He fired at random, authorities said, until the moment he killed himself. Students screamed and crawled on their bellies to escape the auditorium in Cole Hall as bullets and buckshot flew. The gunman, a former graduate student in sociology, carried a shotgun and two handguns. Police said he volunteered no motive before he died. "It started and it stopped very, very quickly," the university's police chief, Donald Grady, said. "This thing started and ended in a matter of seconds." Although the gunman carried identification from another college in the state, Northern Illinois President John G. Peters declined to identify him or the four women and one man who died. Four other students remained in critical condition at local hospitals. The class instructor, a graduate student, was wounded but is expected to recover, officials said.
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February 14, 2008

Mom exonerated after 13 years - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-02-13-exoneratedmom_N.htm...
A woman who spent 13 years in prison after being convicted of strangling her 13-year-old daughter has been exonerated by forensic evidence showing she died of a cocaine overdose, a prosecutor in the case said Wednesday. But even as the district attorney announced that the death of Crystallynn Girard was not a homicide and could not be prosecuted, her now 44-year-old mother, Lynn DeJac, insisted that a former boyfriend was responsible. "It's not going to stay like this. My daughter was not a drug user ... My daughter was murdered. There's no question my daughter was murdered," she said, adding she has not yet considered whether to sue anyone over her conviction.
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February 13, 2008

Mukasey's bid on crack releases is denied - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-mukasey13feb13,1,5078772.st...
Senate Democrats on Tuesday rebuffed Atty. Gen. Michael B. Mukasey's request for legislation that would cancel the U.S. Sentencing Commission's recent decision to retroactively apply lower jail terms to as many as 19,500 crack cocaine offenders sentenced under tough "war on drugs" legislation from the 1980s. About 1,600 of those inmates will be eligible to apply for reduced sentences this year, according to the commission. The new guidelines take effect March 3. Mukasey asked last week that the new recommendations be rolled back, arguing that applications for reductions in sentences could flood the federal courts and put dangerous criminals on the streets. But during Tuesday's Senate hearing before the judiciary subcommittee on crime and drugs, Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) accused Mukasey of creating public fear that "dangerous drug offenders will be instantaneously and automatically set free to prey on hapless communities." Current federal law requires that a powdered cocaine offender possess 100 times more of the drug than a crack cocaine offender to receive the same sentence. For example, 500 grams of powdered cocaine -- but only 5 grams of crack -- calls for a mandatory minimum sentence of five years.
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Texas to free teenage inmate -- chicagotribune.com

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-paris_wittfeb13,1,774199.stor...
Quietly closing another chapter in the long-running sex-abuse scandal inside Texas youth prisons, state officials have reversed themselves and decided to grant early release to a 16-year-old girl from the small east Texas town of Paris who attempted suicide after she was allegedly molested by a male guard. The girl's mother confirmed Tuesday that officials of the Ron Jackson State Juvenile Correctional Complex in Brownwood have written her with instructions to come to the prison on Friday to take her daughter home, four months ahead of her scheduled release date. The emotionally troubled teenager, whose story was reported in several Tribune articles last year, was sent to the youth prison in October 2006 after twice violating her probation for arson for burning down her family's house. She was originally due to have been released in December 2007, but prison authorities extended her term by 6 months after she knocked down a guard who was trying to restrain her after interrupting the girl's attempt to commit suicide.
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February 12, 2008

Defense Official Is Charged in Chinese Espionage Case - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/11/AR2008021101283....
They would meet every few months at restaurants in Northern Virginia, or sometimes take in a show in Las Vegas. Once, the Defense Department official emerged with a half-inch stack of hundred-dollar bills stuffed in his shirt pocket, federal officials said yesterday. His Chinese contact reported back to a handler in Beijing. But FBI agents were tracking the pair, and they moved in yesterday and arrested both men in a case that federal officials said highlights China's increasingly aggressive efforts to obtain U.S. military and trade secrets. The FBI raids came hours before the Defense official, Gregg W. Bergersen, and the Chinese businessman, Tai Shen Kuo, had reservations to meet again at an Alexandria restaurant. Both are charged in U.S. District Court in Alexandria with espionage, one of two cases announced yesterday by the Justice Department that involve alleged Chinese plans to infiltrate U.S. intelligence or companies. In California, a former Boeing engineer was accused of stealing hundreds of thousands of secret company documents about the space shuttle and military programs.
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February 11, 2008

Cheney Joins Congress In Opposing D.C. Gun Ban - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/08/AR2008020803802....
Vice President Cheney signed on to a brief filed by a majority of Congress yesterday that urged the Supreme Court to uphold a ruling that the District of Columbia's handgun ban is unconstitutional, breaking with his own administration's official position. Cheney joined 55 senators and 250 House members in asking the court to find that the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to possess firearms and to uphold a lower court's ruling that the D.C. ban violates that right. That position is at odds with the one put forward by the administration, which angered gun rights advocates when it suggested that the justices return the case to lower courts for further review. In order to make his dramatic break with the administration, Cheney invoked his rarely used status as part of Congress, joining the brief as "President of the United States Senate, Richard B. Cheney." It is a position he has used at times to make the point that he is sometimes part of the legislative branch and sometimes part of the executive.
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Tackling Gun Violence And the Scars It Leaves - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/10/AR2008021002394....
When activist Kenneth Barnes gives speeches decrying gun violence, he typically asks audience members to raise their hands if a family member or friend has been a victim. The response is usually about 5 percent of his adult crowds. But when he speaks to Prince George's County and District students, most raise their hands. In recent months, Barnes's nonprofit organization completed a more formal three-year survey of youths that not only backs up his observations with hard data but paints a portrait of such pervasive exposure to gun crime that it startled even Barnes, as well others who deal with violence. The survey depicts an urban D.C. environment where 80 percent of youths are "highly exposed" to gun violence and, more importantly to Barnes, few are offered help coping. "We're trying to coin the phrase 'current traumatic stress disorder,' " Barnes said, referring to many youths' ongoing exposure. The lack of grief counseling or therapy, Barnes said, predisposes survivors to anti-social and violent activity.
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February 8, 2008

Confusion surrounds new crack sentencing rules - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-mukasey8feb08,1,2051508.sto...
In recent days, Atty. Gen. Michael B. Mukasey has voiced opposition to the early release of hundreds of federal inmates convicted of dealing crack cocaine, saying the move would unleash a potential crime wave in communities across the country. He reiterated his concern Thursday at a hearing before the House Judiciary Committee. But some U.S. attorney offices around the country may not be getting the message. In at least three cases, federal prosecutors have supported efforts to win inmates reduced sentences. Two of the cases are in the Portland, Ore., area, where one inmate is thought to have been released. A third defendant, jailed in Massachusetts, could be released this summer. The disconnect between Justice Department policy and how new sentencing guidelines are being applied in some cases suggests the issue may be more complex than the attorney general has indicated. Under rules approved in December, as many as 19,500 federal inmates may qualify for reduced sentences they received for dealing crack cocaine.
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Majority of Hill Stands Against D.C. Gun Ban - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/07/AR2008020703689....
A majority of the Senate and more than half of the members of the House will file a brief today urging the Supreme Court to uphold a ruling that the District's handgun ban violates the Second Amendment. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Tex.), who led the effort to file the friend-of-the-court brief, said her staff could not find another instance in which such a large portion of Congress had taken a position on an issue before the court. "This court should give due deference to the repeated findings over different historical epochs by Congress, a co-equal branch of government, that the amendment guarantees the personal right to possess firearms," their brief contends. "The District's prohibitions on mere possession by law-abiding persons of handguns in the home and having usable firearms there are unreasonable."
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Mukasey Warns of Drug Case Releases - New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/08/washington/08mukasey.html?ref=washington...
Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey warned Congress on Thursday that unless it enacted legislation quickly, hundreds of people in jail for cocaine offenses, “many of them violent gang members, will be eligible for immediate release into the community nationwide.” But as Mr. Mukasey delivered the message to the House Judiciary Committee at a hearing, he found himself upbraided and criticized by members who said he was vastly overstating the situation. Democrats noted that no one would be released from jail without a hearing before a federal judge who would be obliged to evaluate each case in consultation with the authorities. Representative Maxine Waters, Democrat of California, said Mr. Mukasey was squandering his credibility by raising the fear that many violent offenders would soon be released. Ms. Waters said his statement was misleading and added that the last attorney general, Alberto R. Gonzales, was forced to resign over a lack of credibility.
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62 Indicted in Organized-Crime Roundup in N.Y. - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/07/AR2008020700674....
U.S. and Italian law enforcement officials rounded up dozens of organized-crime figures on Thursday, including the top leadership of New York's notorious Gambino family, in what authorities here described as the biggest takedown of the Mafia in recent memory. Sixty-two people were indicted in New York on charges that ranged from murder and extortion to the theft of union pension funds, and as of Thursday morning, 54 of them were in custody. Those indicted include the Gambino family's acting street "capo," John "Jackie Nose" D'Amico, who was still at large Thursday afternoon. Also indicted were the Gambino family's underboss and its "consigliere." Members of the Genovese and Bonanno crime families were also arrested, but most of the men named in the indictment and arrested were from the Gambino family. The crime family was once led by John Gotti, who was known as the "Dapper Don" and the "Teflon Don."
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Home Standoff in Los Angeles Leaves 5 Dead - New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/08/us/08standoff.html?ref=us...
A lengthy hostage standoff inside a home here ended Thursday morning with the deaths of three hostages, the man who had taken them captive and the first Los Angeles Police Department SWAT team officer ever killed in the line of duty.
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6 killed at city meeting in Missouri - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-kirkwood8feb08,1,2570067.st...
The City Council in suburban Kirkwood, Mo., had just finished the Pledge of Allegiance on Thursday night when a gunman burst into the meeting room and opened fire, shouting "Shoot the mayor!" He killed two police officers and three city officials, and he injured at least two others -- including the mayor -- before law enforcement officers fatally shot him.
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New booming police siren rattling nerves - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-02-07-rumbler_N.htm...
A new police siren that can be felt as well as heard — through closed windows and inside homes and office buildings — is rattling some people who say cops should quit the technology borrowed from souped-up car stereos. Called the Rumbler, the speaker system emits a low, stomach-thumping moan that makes it more noticeable than the high-pitched wail of the traditional siren. Police departments say the Rumbler is a great warning signal that gets the attention of drivers whose hearing can be impaired by blasting car stereos, cellphone gabbing and personal music players. "It has the potential to save lives," says Capt. Jim Wells of the Florida Highway Patrol, who helped develop the Rumbler. But detractors say the Rumbler is far too jarring and annoys more than motorists impeding a cruiser.
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February 7, 2008

Bush to renew drive to confirm nominees - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-bush7feb07,1,5608852.story...
With barely 11 months left in office, President Bush plans to make a new push to win Senate confirmation of nearly 200 nominees to federal judgeships and other government positions. Seeking to put his stamp on federal courts and to demonstrate to conservatives his readiness to take on the Democratic congressional majority, Bush is expected to demand today that the Senate act on his nominations. But senior Senate Democrats and others who have studied the appointments process say the president is not likely to see much action. They blame the White House for repeatedly refusing to consult with senators before making nominations, abusing the recess appointments process that allows an administration to circumvent the Senate, and using the nominations to score points with its most conservative allies.
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Crack-Sentencing Reductions Decried - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/06/AR2008020603822....
The Bush administration wants Congress to thwart a plan to give thousands of federal crack cocaine offenders a chance to marginally reduce prison sentences that are a hundred times more severe than those meted out for powder cocaine offenses. In a statement prepared for his scheduled appearance before the House Judiciary Committee today, Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey said that unless Congress acts, "1,600 convicted crack dealers, many of them violent gang members, will be eligible for immediate release into communities nationwide" under a decision by the U.S. Sentencing Commission. "Retroactive application of these new lower guidelines will pose significant public safety risks . . ." Mukasey said in the statement. "Many of these offenders are among the most serious and violent offenders in the federal system and their early release . . . would produce tragic, but predictable results." The commission, an independent body created by Congress to set parameters for people convicted of federal crimes, voted in December to retroactively apply more relaxed sentencing guidelines to current inmates. The action was aimed at offsetting a disparity between prison time meted out to those convicted of possession or sale of crack cocaine and the sentences given for powder cocaine crimes.
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Crime wave has grip on New Orleans - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-02-06-NOcrime_N.htm...
The crime wave that hit New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina shows little sign of abating, more than two years after city officials said taming the outbreak was among their top priorities. The rates of killings and most types of property crime have kept pace with the city's population increase, according to police records. Sporadic violence also marred the city's famed Mardi Gras celebration since Saturday, with at least nine people wounded by gunshots, including some that were fired near a parade route Tuesday. Recent crime figures show that the number of thefts reported in the first 10 months of 2007 was 51% higher than the same period in 2006; the number of robberies increased 54%, according to police records.
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February 5, 2008

Texas Death Row Inmate Commits Suicide -- chicagotribune.com

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-death-row-suicide,1,522420...
A convicted murderer awaiting execution killed himself in his cell at a psychiatric center just three days after another condemned man on Texas' death row did the same, prison officials said Monday. William Robinson, 49, used a sheet to hang himself from a vent, Texas Department Criminal Justice spokeswoman Michelle Lyons said. Only eight other condemned killers have committed suicide since death row reopened in 1974, including Jesus Flores, who killed himself Jan. 29. Robinson, who was sentenced to death for a 1985 murder, had been held at the Jester IV psychiatric facility in Richmond since September and had spent time there periodically throughout his years on death row, Lyons said. Officers found Robinson hanging at about 5 a.m., Lyons said. They cut the sheet and performed CPR; he was taken to a hospital alive but unresponsive and was put on life support. Robinson's mother decided to cut off life support after doctors said he was most likely brain dead, Lyons said.
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Lawyers Fighting D.C. Gun Ban Argue Against Militia Focus - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/04/AR2008020402591....
If the Constitution protects an individual's right to possess a handgun, then the District's ban on such arms must be declared unconstitutional, lawyers for the man challenging the "nation's most draconian gun laws" told the Supreme Court yesterday. Lawyers for Dick Anthony Heller, a security guard, filed a brief saying that the District's categorical restrictions are so broad that they cannot comply with the Second Amendment's protection of the right to bear arms. "However else [the District] might regulate the possession and use of arms, their complete ban on the home possession of all functional firearms, and their prohibition against home possession and movement of handguns, are unconstitutional," wrote Alan Gura, one of three lawyers representing those who challenged the District's 1976 ban. District of Columbia v. Heller, to be argued before the justices March 18, promises a historic examination of the Second Amendment, which holds that "a well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
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February 1, 2008

Senators aim to close gun-show loophole - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gunshow1feb01,1,5524914.sto...
Gun-control advocates have been largely stymied in their efforts to get significant new firearms restrictions, but they still believe they can achieve one goal: closing a loophole that allows sales at gun shows without background checks on purchasers. This week, two Senate Democrats introduced legislation to close that loophole in federal law, despite a recent failure in Virginia -- where a gunman killed 32 students and teachers at Virginia Tech in April -- to change a similar state law. Accompanied by family members of some of the Virginia Tech victims, along with gun-control advocate Paul Helmke of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, Democratic Sens. Frank R. Lautenberg of New Jersey and Jack Reed of Rhode Island unveiled their proposal at a news conference Wednesday.
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Solving cold cases could get harder - USATODAY.com

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-01-31-coldcasesinside_N.htm...
The cold case concept was established in Miami in the 1980s. A huge backlog of 1,400 unsolved murders kept growing as detectives grappled with murders stemming from the city's cocaine wars and numerous killings resulting from the sudden arrival of 125,000 Cuban refugees in the Mariel Boat Lift, in which Fidel Castro had freed many prisoners to go to the USA. Miami assigned a squad of detectives to look back and see if it could cut into the backlog, according to former Miami-Dade Police Department Sgt. David Rivers. Eventually the advent of DNA technology turned dusty evidence storage rooms into treasure chests of leads and positive identifications. "Everybody was getting them," said Rivers, whose cold case squad solved more than 130 cold cases during his 10 years as its supervisor. The cold case phenomenom became so popular it went Hollywood. Television viewers got a peek into the parlance of cold case detectives with shows like Cold Case and Cold Case Files.
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High Court Grants Stay In Alabama Execution - washingtonpost.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/31/AR2008013103947....
A murderer who would have become the nation's first executed inmate in months won a reprieve Thursday from the U.S. Supreme Court a little more than an hour before he was scheduled to die by lethal injection. James Harvey Callahan, set to die at 6 p.m. Central time, was granted a stay, Holman prison warden Grantt Culliver told officers on death row. The Supreme Court's brief order did not detail why it granted the stay. It would have been the nation's first execution since September, when the high court agreed to consider whether lethal injection is cruel and unusual punishment. The inmate's attorney had asked the high court to halt the execution after a federal appeals court lifted a stay granted by a Montgomery judge.
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January 31, 2008

Quote prompts judge to quit case - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-nichols31jan31,1,3772650.st...
After being quoted in a magazine article as saying of defendant, 'Everyone in the world knows he did it,' a jurist recuses himself from a murder trial.
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Democrats decry Mukasey's silence on waterboarding - Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-mukasey31jan31,1,7962368.st...
Senate Democrats assailed Atty. Gen. Michael B. Mukasey on Wednesday for refusing to offer an opinion on the legality of waterboarding, an interrogation method that many consider a form of illegal torture. In often sharp exchanges, the lawmakers accused Mukasey of trying to protect the Bush administration, with one comparing him to a corporate lawyer trying to cover up the misdeeds of his client. Another accused him of playing word games and engaging in the sort of political double-talk that he said he would seek to avoid as attorney general. "I would say, Mr. Attorney General, on the subject of waterboarding, that some of your words have melted into the abstract," said Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), paraphrasing a critique of political speech by George Orwell, one of Mukasey's favorite writers.
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NYPD Detective Accused of Pimping Teen -- chicagotribune.com

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-detective-teen-prostitute,..