Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Wednesday, February 7, 2007
Children ARE the new terrorists!
Should youths be in chains?
N.C. latest facing questions on shackles for juvenile suspects
Child advocacy groups in North Carolina are attacking the practice of shackling children during juvenile court hearings as unlawful and emotionally abusive.
But sheriff's officials say it's necessary to keep troubled children from running away or disrupting court.
Criticism of the practice has been growing around the country, with litigation cropping up from Florida to California to North Dakota.
The legal controversy arrived in North Carolina on Monday when lawyers filed a motion in Greensboro protesting the shackling of a 14-year-old girl facing larceny charges.
They said the girl had previously been handcuffed by a molester, and that she cried during an August court appearance when the shackles triggered flashbacks of the sexual assault.
Her lawyers asked Guilford County judges to end the practice of shackling children there, except in cases where a specific child poses a threat. The motion asserts that shackling unlawfully violates children's rights to be presumed innocent, as well as other legal protections afforded adult suspects.
"Without a finding that (juveniles) pose a threat to themselves or others or pose a threat of fleeing, they should not be shackled," said Keith Howard, a lawyer with Legal Aid of North Carolina.
Legal Aid attorneys want new laws to end the practice statewide. Some lawyers in Charlotte want the practice ended in Mecklenburg courtrooms.
As many as 30 children come to Mecklenburg's juvenile court each week for detention hearings at which judges must decide whether they will remain in custody or be released while the charges against them move through the legal system.
Some face charges as serious as murder, but state juvenile justice records suggest most typically face charges such as breaking and entering and larceny.
During hearings Monday afternoon, children were shackled at the ankles with a thin chain that looked to be about 2 feet long. Children in Charlotte are also shackled during mental health commitment hearings -- a fact officials with the nonprofit Council for Children's Rights find particularly disturbing.
"A lot of times these kids have post-traumatic stress disorder," said Valerie Pearce, an attorney with the council. "And then you're adding shackles. It just frightens them to death."
But a spokeswoman for the Mecklenburg Sheriff's Office said the policy is necessary because some juveniles are violent, and many would run away. She said some fight during transport from juvenile jails, or turn rowdy in court.
"They're not the most disciplined kids. Some of them are meek and scared, but not many," said the spokeswoman, Julia Rush. "These are not throwaway kids, but our experience has shown they will turn on you in a heartbeat."
In Florida, where debate over shackling has raged in recent months, judges have decided the issue. Judges in Broward and Miami-Dade counties stopped the indiscriminate shackling of juvenile suspects; judges in Palm Beach County allowed it to continue.
It isn't clear exactly how widespread the practice is in courtrooms across North Carolina, but several officials said juveniles are generally shackled.
Mecklenburg District Judge Lou Trosch said local courts don't have specific rules governing shackling. He added that most judges follow the sheriff's policy, but deviate from it when necessary.
Monday afternoon in Courtroom 8370, adolescent girls accused of crimes ranging from robbery with a dangerous weapon to probation violation appeared in court. Several smiled, flashing braces. Their leg shackles jingled as they moved to the defendant's table.
Outside the courtroom, one girl's mother said she could understand officials' need to keep some children shackled.
"They should do it on a case-by-case basis," she said, then added: "It's kind of hard. You don't want your kids down here in the first place, much less shackled."
N.C. latest facing questions on shackles for juvenile suspects
Child advocacy groups in North Carolina are attacking the practice of shackling children during juvenile court hearings as unlawful and emotionally abusive.But sheriff's officials say it's necessary to keep troubled children from running away or disrupting court.
Criticism of the practice has been growing around the country, with litigation cropping up from Florida to California to North Dakota.
The legal controversy arrived in North Carolina on Monday when lawyers filed a motion in Greensboro protesting the shackling of a 14-year-old girl facing larceny charges.
They said the girl had previously been handcuffed by a molester, and that she cried during an August court appearance when the shackles triggered flashbacks of the sexual assault.
Her lawyers asked Guilford County judges to end the practice of shackling children there, except in cases where a specific child poses a threat. The motion asserts that shackling unlawfully violates children's rights to be presumed innocent, as well as other legal protections afforded adult suspects.
"Without a finding that (juveniles) pose a threat to themselves or others or pose a threat of fleeing, they should not be shackled," said Keith Howard, a lawyer with Legal Aid of North Carolina.
Legal Aid attorneys want new laws to end the practice statewide. Some lawyers in Charlotte want the practice ended in Mecklenburg courtrooms.
As many as 30 children come to Mecklenburg's juvenile court each week for detention hearings at which judges must decide whether they will remain in custody or be released while the charges against them move through the legal system.
Some face charges as serious as murder, but state juvenile justice records suggest most typically face charges such as breaking and entering and larceny.
During hearings Monday afternoon, children were shackled at the ankles with a thin chain that looked to be about 2 feet long. Children in Charlotte are also shackled during mental health commitment hearings -- a fact officials with the nonprofit Council for Children's Rights find particularly disturbing.
"A lot of times these kids have post-traumatic stress disorder," said Valerie Pearce, an attorney with the council. "And then you're adding shackles. It just frightens them to death."
But a spokeswoman for the Mecklenburg Sheriff's Office said the policy is necessary because some juveniles are violent, and many would run away. She said some fight during transport from juvenile jails, or turn rowdy in court.
"They're not the most disciplined kids. Some of them are meek and scared, but not many," said the spokeswoman, Julia Rush. "These are not throwaway kids, but our experience has shown they will turn on you in a heartbeat."
In Florida, where debate over shackling has raged in recent months, judges have decided the issue. Judges in Broward and Miami-Dade counties stopped the indiscriminate shackling of juvenile suspects; judges in Palm Beach County allowed it to continue.
It isn't clear exactly how widespread the practice is in courtrooms across North Carolina, but several officials said juveniles are generally shackled.
Mecklenburg District Judge Lou Trosch said local courts don't have specific rules governing shackling. He added that most judges follow the sheriff's policy, but deviate from it when necessary.
Monday afternoon in Courtroom 8370, adolescent girls accused of crimes ranging from robbery with a dangerous weapon to probation violation appeared in court. Several smiled, flashing braces. Their leg shackles jingled as they moved to the defendant's table.
Outside the courtroom, one girl's mother said she could understand officials' need to keep some children shackled.
"They should do it on a case-by-case basis," she said, then added: "It's kind of hard. You don't want your kids down here in the first place, much less shackled."
Will cops behave now? I doubt it!
Police accountability? I have a feeling this waste of taxpayer dollars will be about as effective as most state's Judicial oversight committees...And the corruption will go on
Tuesday, February 6, 2007
And when a cop is good...he gets this
Former Anderson officer charged with misconduct : Local News : Anderson Independent Mail Anderson let weed smokers (AKA Terrorists) off the hook...Shame Shame Officer Anderson
It's for your security, so we can KNOW you are who you say you are!
Biometrics for all
Time to take a reading of advanced ID technology
February 6, 2007
By Paul Jay
Fingerprint analysis has long been a staple of law enforcement, first as a means of placing a person at the scene of a crime, and later as an identification tool for keeping a database of criminals. But fingerprinting has a largely negative connotation, which would seem to make it an unlikely practice for personal or public use.
Yet biometrics — the use of a person's unique physical characteristics or traits to identify them — has moved from the pages of espionage thrillers to the mainstream. Fingerprint scanning and its futuristic cousins, iris scanning and facial recognition, are now widespread. The International Civil Aviation Organization is pushing for biometric data to be included in passports. Airports are testing a variety of biometric devices, from iris scans at Vancouver International Airport to voice-stress analyzers in Israel.
Perhaps more tellingly, biometric devices are becoming accessible to consumers, who are offered everything from facial recognition programs that let people search and sort photos to fingerprint readers on laptops to act as a security measure or a password manager.
For years we've been told to expect the arrival of this new wave of technology, and now that it's literally at our fingertips, what should we make of it? With biometrics appearing in the mainstream, will public resistance to identification tools commonly associated with criminal identification stiffen or waver?
Luc Dénommée, president of the biometric technology company SBG International in Drummondville, Que., thinks the public will embrace the technology once they understand it.
"What we need is to educate people, to show them that these tools will protect them first," said Dénommée. "For years people thought microwaves were dangerous, but now every house has them."
He points to his company's fingerprint scanner as an example of the latest in biometric security. The fingerprint ID system records data from 17 points on the print and constructs a template on the computer based on that data, meaning no actual image of the fingerprint is on the computer for a potential hacker to steal.
Current scanners also measure heart beat and temperature to prevent what biometric experts refer to as the "gummy finger," a technique for hacking fingerprint databases first demonstrated by Japanese researcher Tsutomu Matsumoto in 2002, in which a gelatin mould was used to make prints lifted from a glass.
Dénommée said businesses have already begun to see the value of the added level of security, and he thinks it's only a matter of time before consumers embrace the technology for use in the home.
"As an example, I am a father of two children and I have parental control, but my children are very smart, and they could figure a way to use my log-in," he said. "But I don't want my kids to open an e-mail and accidentally lose my accounts, so if I use a finger scanner I can keep them out."
Fingerprint technology is still primarily the purview of government, said Allan Brousseau, vice-president of business development of Comnetix, an Oakville, Ont.-based biometric information company with public and private sector clients.
But Brousseau expects the consumer market for the technology to grow dramatically in the next five to 10 years.
"Why have all of these passwords if you can just swipe your finger?" he asked. "Right now we put too much faith in security features that aren't secure. Credit cards, for example, rely on cashiers making $10 an hour to do signature comparisons. That's not very secure."
Concerns over reliability
Although personal use of biometric tools could have value, Andrew Clement, a professor at the University of Toronto's Faculty of Information Studies, has concerns about how secure these technologies are, pointing to the "gummy-finger" as an example of the race between security experts and hackers.
"I'd be concerned about putting all of my ID eggs in a single biometric basket," said Clement. "What happens if it doesn't recognize you anymore? It could be harder to correct."
Not all fingerprint scanners are intended for security applications, which could cause confusion among some consumers. Microsoft's Fingerprint Reader (which retails for $50), available since 2004 and recently upgraded to be used with Microsoft's new Vista operating system, is meant to tie all of the user's passwords to a fingerprint. But as the company has repeatedly said, the scanner is used for convenience and is not a security feature to replace passwords for accessing sensitive data.
Fingerprint scanners with added encryption technology cost over $100 at the low end of the price spectrum, with extra security software adding to the cost.
Clement also worries that as people become accustomed to biometric technology, they will become tolerant of more intrusive approaches.
"A concern is we will become habituated to giving out our biometric data," said Clement, a member of the Information Policy Research Program. "Fingerprinting has been overly stigmatized because of its criminal history. But when it becomes routine it might lull us into a false sense of security," he said.
Of particular concern for Clement is government adoption of the technologies in passports and border security. For example, some American airports are using a new security program modelled after Israeli airport screening techniques called SPOT, or Screening Passengers by Observation Techniques. An automated version of SPOT is also being tested using a device called Cogito that asks passengers to answer a series of questions on a touch screen while measuring biometric responses such as blood pressure.
The International Civil Aviation Organization has made recommendations to include at least one other piece of biometric identification into passports besides a facial portrait, though governments have not uniformly embraced the standards.
Biometric border identification
Canadian passport requirements have not been upgraded since 2002 and do not currently use biometric components. But the Canada Border Services Agency's NEXUS program, promoted as a way for low-risk travellers to cross the Canadian-U.S. border, does use the technologies.
Started in 2002, NEXUS now has more than 110,000 members in Canada and the U.S. who pay an $80 fee for a five-year membership the agency says allows them quicker access through border security. Most of these members use the NEXUS highway service, which requires applicants to undergo an electronic scan of their index fingers for comparison against a database of immigration violators at the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service.
One of the agency's pilot projects, NEXUS Air, also has 1,700 participants who provide iris scans when passing through Vancouver International Airport. The program could be rolled out into another city soon, said agency spokesman Derek Mellon.
Clement worries that reliance on increasingly sensitive biometric data could yield false positives and lead to longer delays at border crossings and consequently a reliance on other kinds of profiling.
While fingerprint and iris scanners and facial recognition programs remain the most common technologies in place today, other types are being tested, said Svetlana Yanushkevich, an associate professor and biometric researcher at the University of Calgary.
Lesser-known innovations in limited use or in the research stage include:
* Skin spectrum scans that read the subcutaneous layers of skin on the hand unique to each person.
* Infrared readers for measuring body temperature changes that might be an indicator of a disease such as SARS.
* Voice stress analysis similar to a polygraph, used in conjunction with measures of blood flow.
Dimitrios Hatzinakos, a professor who works with advanced biometrics, understands the public mistrust in the technology.
"It's very personal to give this information, like exposing yourself," said Hatzinakos, the Bell Canada Chair in Multimedia at the University of Toronto. "People feel naked in a way."
Hatzinakos points to the still-developing research in gait recognition, which analyzes and compares individuals by the way they walk, as an example of a biometric with a variety of applications. It could be used in conjunction with security cameras by the military to identify individuals whose identities are otherwise obscured. Or it could be put in a senior citizens home to watch for signs of degenerative diseases such as Parkinson's.
Hatzinakos thinks scientists working in the field should strive to develop the most reliable technology at the same time as they try to gain the public's trust in the technology. These two goals go hand-in-hand, he said.
"We need to do a better job of communicating the useful and potentially life-saving applications of these tools, and then work to create regulations and technologies in parallel with the technology," he said.
WHAT'S NEXT? YOU DECIDE HOW MUCH YOU'LL TAKE
The truth about us
This is our favorite video down at the station, we are thinking of making itpart of our training This story is no suprise, we like to torture Americans, it helps the bonds of brotherhood.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – A video clip of a high-ranking NYPD commander attempting to arrest a protester during a 2003 demonstration in lower Manhattan — part of a federal civil lawsuit charging excessive force — is making waves on the Internet and in the department.
The 32-year veteran facing the allegations is Assistant Chief Bruce Smolka, head of Patrol Borough Manhattan South, who is retiring soon even as the case approaches trial in federal court in Manhattan.
In a deposition Smolka gave as part of the lawsuit, he suggests that the demonstrator, Cynthia Greenberg, got hurt when her head somehow made contact with his knee during the confrontation at 26 Federal Plaza.
“I saw her head strike my knee,” Smolka says in the deposition, referring to Greenberg, the plaintiff in the lawsuit. “I was moving. She perhaps rocked and that is how her knee, my knee, came in contact with her head.”
When contacted for comment, Smolka had a subordinate tell Newsday he wouldn’t discuss the lawsuit. The NYPD press office also had no comment.
Greenberg contends that the video of the May 5, 2003 altercation, shot by an independent freelance journalist, shows otherwise.
The video, viewed recently by Newsday, shows Smolka’s left knee hitting Greenberg’s head as he bends over her, trying to separate her from another protester with whom she had locked arms. Greenberg immediately grabs her head, clearly in pain.
Though only seconds long, it looks bad. And now it is on the Internet for all to see and decide for themselves.
Greenberg maintains the video doesn’t capture the entire incident. Smolka, she says, kicked her at least twice in the head and a number of times about the body, with some blows inflicted while she was sitting and the rest after she had been sent sprawling onto her stomach.
Each kick, she says, was accompanied by graphic verbal invective — an obscenity, combined with a scatological reference, followed by Smolka’s assertion that Greenberg was resisting.
“You — – ,” Greenberg recalls Smolka yelling. “‘You’re resisting, you — – !’ I kept telling him, ‘I’m not resisting. You’re hitting me.’ His rage was intense.”
Smolka, 54, was shown the video by one of Greenberg’s lawyers when he was deposed in December 2005. He acknowledges his image on the video — “It looked like it” — according to his deposition. He says that he didn’t try to hurt Greenberg and that, had he intentionally struck her, that action would have been unreasonable and excessive. He also says in the deposition that he did not repeatedly kick Greenberg, as she charges, and denies cursing at her.
Toward the end of his deposition, Smolka says he had no immediate recollection of the incident when Greenberg filed the suit on Oct. 30, 2003. Greenberg, a consultant who lives in Williamsburg, alleges she suffered a concussion and had to seek medical treatment.
The protest at 26 Federal Plaza, and the police response to it, got little attention at the time.
The confrontation took place at a small rally by about 50 activists protesting both the war in Iraq and the U.S. government’s treatment of immigrants. It has been overshadowed since by much larger demonstrations — and allegations of improper police behavior — during the 2004 Republican National Convention and the monthly Critical Mass bicycle gatherings.
Greenberg, now 37, is determined to hold Smolka accountable.
“It sends a very clear message to lower-ranking officers that that kind of behavior is permissible, acceptable and correct,” said Greenberg. “It’s one thing when a young officer makes a mistake. It’s another when someone so high-ranking does it.”
Smolka — who over his career has commanded the Midtown North precinct, the 17th Precinct in Midtown and the Emergency Services Unit — is one of the NYPD’s most visible and controversial figures. He was thrust into the headlines when the unarmed Amadou Diallo was killed in the Bronx in 1999 by four officers who worked for Smolka in the Street Crime Unit. Smolka eventually was transferred and the unit disbanded, but his star rose again.
As head of Patrol Borough Manhattan South since April 2004, Smolka has been front and center at virtually every major city event in the last several years, most notably the various protests during the RNC and the Critical Mass rallies.
As such, he has won the enmity of many a protester who says he is too quick to address civil disobedience with physical force. At the same time, his direct, forceful manner has won him the admiration of many within the department, though there are others who don’t like his unyielding personality.
Regardless, he won’t be a commanding officer in the NYPD much longer.
Smolka has filed his retirement papers and is expected to leave the department soon for a security job with Revlon, police sources say.
The timing may or may not be coincidental, but one thing is sure: He’ll likely have to take time off to testify. Smolka also is named in several other pending suits, including cases involving the RNC and Critical Mass
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – A video clip of a high-ranking NYPD commander attempting to arrest a protester during a 2003 demonstration in lower Manhattan — part of a federal civil lawsuit charging excessive force — is making waves on the Internet and in the department.
The 32-year veteran facing the allegations is Assistant Chief Bruce Smolka, head of Patrol Borough Manhattan South, who is retiring soon even as the case approaches trial in federal court in Manhattan.
In a deposition Smolka gave as part of the lawsuit, he suggests that the demonstrator, Cynthia Greenberg, got hurt when her head somehow made contact with his knee during the confrontation at 26 Federal Plaza.
“I saw her head strike my knee,” Smolka says in the deposition, referring to Greenberg, the plaintiff in the lawsuit. “I was moving. She perhaps rocked and that is how her knee, my knee, came in contact with her head.”
When contacted for comment, Smolka had a subordinate tell Newsday he wouldn’t discuss the lawsuit. The NYPD press office also had no comment.
Greenberg contends that the video of the May 5, 2003 altercation, shot by an independent freelance journalist, shows otherwise.
The video, viewed recently by Newsday, shows Smolka’s left knee hitting Greenberg’s head as he bends over her, trying to separate her from another protester with whom she had locked arms. Greenberg immediately grabs her head, clearly in pain.
Though only seconds long, it looks bad. And now it is on the Internet for all to see and decide for themselves.
Greenberg maintains the video doesn’t capture the entire incident. Smolka, she says, kicked her at least twice in the head and a number of times about the body, with some blows inflicted while she was sitting and the rest after she had been sent sprawling onto her stomach.
Each kick, she says, was accompanied by graphic verbal invective — an obscenity, combined with a scatological reference, followed by Smolka’s assertion that Greenberg was resisting.
“You — – ,” Greenberg recalls Smolka yelling. “‘You’re resisting, you — – !’ I kept telling him, ‘I’m not resisting. You’re hitting me.’ His rage was intense.”
Smolka, 54, was shown the video by one of Greenberg’s lawyers when he was deposed in December 2005. He acknowledges his image on the video — “It looked like it” — according to his deposition. He says that he didn’t try to hurt Greenberg and that, had he intentionally struck her, that action would have been unreasonable and excessive. He also says in the deposition that he did not repeatedly kick Greenberg, as she charges, and denies cursing at her.
Toward the end of his deposition, Smolka says he had no immediate recollection of the incident when Greenberg filed the suit on Oct. 30, 2003. Greenberg, a consultant who lives in Williamsburg, alleges she suffered a concussion and had to seek medical treatment.
The protest at 26 Federal Plaza, and the police response to it, got little attention at the time.
The confrontation took place at a small rally by about 50 activists protesting both the war in Iraq and the U.S. government’s treatment of immigrants. It has been overshadowed since by much larger demonstrations — and allegations of improper police behavior — during the 2004 Republican National Convention and the monthly Critical Mass bicycle gatherings.
Greenberg, now 37, is determined to hold Smolka accountable.
“It sends a very clear message to lower-ranking officers that that kind of behavior is permissible, acceptable and correct,” said Greenberg. “It’s one thing when a young officer makes a mistake. It’s another when someone so high-ranking does it.”
Smolka — who over his career has commanded the Midtown North precinct, the 17th Precinct in Midtown and the Emergency Services Unit — is one of the NYPD’s most visible and controversial figures. He was thrust into the headlines when the unarmed Amadou Diallo was killed in the Bronx in 1999 by four officers who worked for Smolka in the Street Crime Unit. Smolka eventually was transferred and the unit disbanded, but his star rose again.
As head of Patrol Borough Manhattan South since April 2004, Smolka has been front and center at virtually every major city event in the last several years, most notably the various protests during the RNC and the Critical Mass rallies.
As such, he has won the enmity of many a protester who says he is too quick to address civil disobedience with physical force. At the same time, his direct, forceful manner has won him the admiration of many within the department, though there are others who don’t like his unyielding personality.
Regardless, he won’t be a commanding officer in the NYPD much longer.
Smolka has filed his retirement papers and is expected to leave the department soon for a security job with Revlon, police sources say.
The timing may or may not be coincidental, but one thing is sure: He’ll likely have to take time off to testify. Smolka also is named in several other pending suits, including cases involving the RNC and Critical Mass
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