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Police Corruption News Articles
Excerpts of key news articles on


Below are key excerpts of revealing news articles on police corruption from reliable news media sources. If any link fails to function, a paywall blocks full access, or the article is no longer available, try these digital tools.


Note: Explore our full index to revealing excerpts of key major media news articles on dozens of engaging topics. And read excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.


U.S. police escape federal charges in 96 percent of rights cases
2016-03-13, Reuters
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-police-idUSKCN0WF0KM

Federal prosecutors declined to bring charges against law enforcement officers in the United States facing allegations of civil rights violations in 96 percent of such cases between 1995 and 2015, according to an investigation by the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review newspaper. The newspaper examined nearly 3 million U.S. Justice Department records related to how the department's 94 U.S. attorney's offices across the country ... handled civil rights cases against officers. The data included cases referred to the Justice Department by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other agencies. Overall, prosecutors turned down 12,703 potential civil rights violations out of 13,233 total complaints. By contrast, prosecutors rejected only about 23 percent of referrals in all other types of criminal cases. The findings could bolster arguments by activists, such as those involved in the Black Lives Matter movement, who claim police officers are rarely held criminally responsible for their misconduct. The report comes just days after the U.S. attorney in Manhattan, Preet Bharara, announced he would not press charges against a white officer who killed an unarmed black teenager inside his own apartment in 2012. The most common reasons that prosecutors cited for declining to bring civil rights cases against officers were weak or insufficient evidence, lack of criminal intent and orders from the Justice Department.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles about government corruption and the erosion of civil liberties.


Leaked police files contain guarantees disciplinary records will be kept secret
2016-02-07, The Guardian (One of the UK's leading newspapers)
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/feb/07/leaked-police-files-contain-gu...

Contracts between police and city authorities, leaked after hackers breached the website of the country’s biggest law enforcement union, contain guarantees that disciplinary records and complaints made against officers are kept secret or even destroyed. A Guardian analysis of dozens of contracts obtained from the servers of the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) found that more than a third featured clauses allowing – and often mandating – the destruction of records of civilian complaints, departmental investigations, or disciplinary actions. 30% of the 67 leaked police contracts, which were struck between cities and police unions, included provisions barring public access to records of past civilian complaints, departmental investigations, and disciplinary actions. The leaked contracts became publicly accessible ... when hackers breached the Fraternal Order of Police’s website and put around 2.5GB worth of its files online. These provide a glimpse into the influence of police unions, which Black Lives Matter activists have accused of impeding misconduct investigations. The documents date back almost two decades. Many contain numerous recurring clauses that slow down misconduct investigations. [Many] substantiated use-of-force allegations fail even to garner penalties as high as a reprimand with suspension. In cases between 2010 and 2015 in which the NYPD’s office of the inspector general confirmed that officers had used unwarranted excessive force, officers were given no discipline 35.6% of the time.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing police corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.


Police Response To San Bernardino Stokes Militarization Fears
2015-12-04, NPR
http://www.npr.org/2015/12/04/458426970/reformers-fear-police-will-revisit-mi...

On the day of the mass shooting in San Bernardino, Calif., the city's SWAT team was training for an active shooter situation just minutes away from the scene of the massacre. "We were just working through scenarios when this call went out," says Lt. Travis Walker, the SWAT team commander. Walker was running his officers through scenarios with volunteers playing the role of shooters. "We'd just finished a training scenario that involved multiple shooters at multiple locations within a small confined area," he says. And then they were off — to the scene of a real-life multiple-shooter attack. They didn't get there in time to stop it, but the suspects were killed in a shootout later in the day. Walker and his team were there for that, too, using armored vehicles to get close. That scene was meaningful because those were the very same kind of armored vehicles that for the past year or so have become a symbol of what some people call police militarization.

Important Note: So "by coincidence" a team was training for a terrorist event the very day of this shooting not far from the scene. The very same "coincidence" happened in the recent Paris shootings, on the day of 9/11 where a team was training in DC for an attack where a plane would hit a government building, and the London bombings where a team was training for a subway terrorist attack that very morning at the same stations where the bombings occurred. Could all four be just coincidences? Might this have been another false flag operation to promote fear and the militarization agenda? Read also solid evidence that ISIS was a creation of intelligence services, including a confession by a USAF General that "we helped build ISIS."


In tough times, police start seizing a lot more stuff from people
2015-11-10, Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/11/10/report-in-lean-times-p...

Civil asset forfeiture ... lets police seize and keep cash and property from people who are never convicted - and in many cases, even charged - with wrongdoing. The past decade has seen a "meteoric, exponential increase" in the use of the practice. In 2008, there were less than $1.5 billion in the combined asset forfeiture funds of the Justice Department and the U.S. Treasury. But by 2014, that number had tripled, to roughly $4.5 billion. Critics ... say that the increase in forfeiture activity is due largely to the profit motive created by laws which allow police to keep some or all of the assets they seize. In one case represented by the Institute [for Justice], a drug task force seized $11,000 from a college student at an airport. They lacked evidence to charge him with any crime, but they kept the money and planned to divvy it up between 13 different law enforcement agencies. Asset forfeiture's defenders say that the practice is instrumental in dismantling large-scale criminal enterprises. But evidence suggests that forfeiture proceedings are often initiated against small time criminals or people who aren't criminals at all. An [ACLU] report earlier this year found that the median amount seized in forfeiture actions in Philadelphia amounted to $192. These forfeiture actions were concentrated in the city's poorest neighborhoods. In most states the typical forfeiture amount is very small. The median forfeiture case in Illinois is worth $530. In Minnesota, $451. Those are hardly kingpin-level hauls.

Note: Some police decide what property to seize based on departmental "wish lists". For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles about government corruption and the erosion of civil liberties.


Hundreds of officers lose licenses over sex misconduct
2015-11-01, Chicago Tribune/Associated Press
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/ct-police-officer-sexual-misco...

In a yearlong investigation of sexual misconduct by U.S. law enforcement, The Associated Press uncovered about 1,000 officers who lost their badges in a six-year period for rape, sodomy and other sexual assault; sex crimes that included possession of child pornography; or sexual misconduct such as propositioning citizens. The number is unquestionably an undercount because it represents only those officers whose licenses to work in law enforcement were revoked, and not all states take such action. California and New York ... offered no records because they have no statewide system to decertify officers for misconduct. And even among states that provided records, some reported no officers removed for sexual misdeeds even though cases were identified via news stories or court records. Victims of sexual violence at the hands of officers know the power their attackers have, and so the trauma can carry an especially crippling fear. Jackie Simmons said she found it too daunting to bring her accusation to another police officer after being raped by a cop in 1998 while visiting Kansas for a wedding. So, like most victims of rape, she never filed a report. Diane Wetendorf, a retired counselor who started a support group in Chicago for victims of officers, said most of the women she counseled never reported their crimes - and many who did regretted it. She saw women whose homes came under surveillance and whose children were intimidated by police. Fellow officers, she said, refused to turn on one another when questioned.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on police corruption and sexual abuse scandals.


FBI director calls lack of data on police shootings ‘ridiculous,’ ‘embarrassing’
2015-10-07, Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/fbi-director-calls-lack-of-data-on-po...

FBI Director James B. Comey said Wednesday, speaking to a private gathering of more than 100 politicians and top law enforcement officials, ... that the federal government has no better data on police shootings than databases assembled this year by The Washington Post and the Guardian newspaper. “It is unacceptable that The Washington Post and the Guardian newspaper from the U.K. are becoming the lead source of information about violent encounters between police and civilians. That is not good for anybody,” he said. The FBI has for years collected information about people killed by police officers, but reporting is voluntary and only 3 percent of the nation’s 18,000 police departments comply. As a result, the data is virtually useless. The Post’s database, for example, shows that 758 people have been shot and killed by police so far this year — nearly double the number recorded in a single year by the FBI. The vast majority of those killed were armed with a deadly weapon. However, blacks represent a disproportionate percentage of those who were unarmed when they were killed, the database shows.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing government corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.


An interview with the Baltimore cop who's revealing all the horrible things he saw on the job
2015-06-25, Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2015/06/25/an-interview-with-...

A former Baltimore Police Department officer named Michael Wood caused a stir online when he began tweeting some of the horrible things he claims to have seen during his 11 years on the job. Here's a [phone interview] transcript, interspersed with some of Wood's tweets. Balko: You mentioned seeing cops urinate and defecate in the homes of suspects, even on their beds and their clothes. How common was that? Wood: There’s a particular unit that does that. Everyone knew it. They usually blame it on the dog. [Tweet] "A detective slapping a completely innocent female in the face for bumping into him." Balko: One common criticism asked why you didn’t report these incidents. Wood: I’m totally guilty. I should have done more. [Tweet] "Swearing in court and [official documents] that suspect dropped CDS [controlled dangerous substances] during unbroken visual pursuit when neither was true." Wood: It all goes back to this whole us versus them thing. Your job is to fight crime, and these are the guys you do it with. They aren’t really even people. They’re just the enemy. This is the culture. There’s a powerful bureaucracy at any big city police department. A few guys run the whole show. A few old white guys hand-pick who climbs the ranks. [Tweet] "Targeting 16-24 year old black males essentially because we arrest them more, perpetrating the circle of arresting them more." Balko: How do we make things better? Wood: I think it starts with empathy. We need to stop all this warrior talk, the militaristic language, and the us versus them rhetoric.

Note: Read the entire revealing article for a rare glimpse into the common corruption inside a big city police department. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption from reliable major media sources.


How two police agencies built a money-laundering machine
2015-06-19, Miami Herald (Miami's leading newspaper)
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/article24912115.html

It began in a trailer in the shadows of one of Florida's most elegant malls, a brazen plan by two small police agencies to take on the hemisphere's most dangerous drug cartels. Forming their own task force, members of the Bal Harbour police and Glades County Sheriff's Office struck deals with criminal organizations across the country in what grew into the largest state undercover money-laundering investigation in years. Posing as launderers, the task force took in $55.6 million from the criminal groups, keeping thousands each week for themselves for laundering the money. They spent lavishly on first-class flights and five-star hotel stays. They bought Mac computers and submachine guns. In the end, they made no arrests of their own, and ended up returning all the money they laundered to the criminal groups. They also withdrew $1 million in cash with no records to show where the money went – and struck millions in additional money-laundering deals that were never disclosed.

Note: Read the full series of articles on this incredibly corrupt situation. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing government corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.


Child sex abuse: Judges, MPs, media entertainers, actors, police and clergy implicated in Met Police corruption probe
2015-03-29, The Independent (One of the UK's leading newspapers)
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/child-sex-abuse-judges-mps-media-e...

The Metropolitan Police is being investigated over further allegations of corruption in relation to child sex offences dating back to the 1970s, including the claim that evidence gathered against MPs, judges, media entertainers, police, clergy and actors was dropped due to police intervention. The fresh allegations are in addition to the 14 cases being investigated by the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC), revealed earlier this month, dating from the 1970s to the 2000s. The three new investigations relate to allegations about police suppressing evidence, hindering or halting investigations, and covering up offences due to the involvement of members of parliament and police officers. One case addressed the allegation that a child abuse investigation in central London, which gathered evidence against MPs, judges, media entertainers, police, actors, clergy, and others, was dropped. It has been claimed that two months after the file had been submitted to start proceedings against those identified, an officer was called in by a senior Met officer and told to drop the case. The two further allegations relate to a child abuse investigation conducted in the 1980s, with one relating directly to police actions in the case. The IPCC said it was also assessing a further six referrals it had received from the Met relating to similar matters.

Note: Explore powerful evidence from a suppressed Discovery Channel documentary showing that child sexual abuse scandals reach to the highest levels of government. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles about sexual abuse scandals and government corruption from reliable major media sources.


UK Police Watchdog to Investigate Westminster Child Abuse Cover-Up
2015-03-16, Newsweek
http://www.newsweek.com/uk-police-watchdog-investigate-westminster-child-abus...

The UK police watchdog has announced that it is investigating the Metropolitan Police following allegations that the force was involved in a cover-up over child abuse offenses. The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) has launched the investigation after the Met referred themselves over 16 separate allegations - 14 of which are to be investigated. The IPCC will look into claims of corruption within the force and whether they purposefully ignored evidence and halted investigations due to the involvement of MPs and other members of the establishment. This most recent development comes as a result of Operation Fairbank, first launched by Scotland Yard in 2012, to probe suggestions that high profile figures were involved in historic Westminster paedophile rings. Since then detectives have also opened up inquiries into the murder of three boys who it’s alleged were killed by those involved in such rings, claims which ... have resulted in the police calling for witnesses as they have been unable to identify the victims. One of the 14 referrals for the IPCC says that “a proactive operation targeting young men in Dolphin Square was stopped because officers were too near prominent people”, while another is about “allegations that a politician had spoken with a senior Met Police officer and demanded no action was taken regarding a paedophile ring and boys being procured and supplied to prominent persons in Westminster in the 1970s”.

Note: Explore powerful evidence from a suppressed Discovery Channel documentary showing that child sexual abuse scandals reach to the highest levels of government. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles about sexual abuse scandals and government corruption from reliable major media sources.


Covert police unit spied on trade union members, whistleblower reveals
2015-03-13, The Independent (One of the UK's leading newspapers)
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/undercover-with-paul-lewis-and-rob-evans/2...

An undercover police unit that monitored political groups over 40 years gathered intelligence on members of at least five trade unions, a whistleblower has revealed. Peter Francis, who spent four years undercover infiltrating political activists, has named five trade unions whose members he spied on: Unison, the Fire Brigades Union, Communication Workers Union, National Union of Teachers, and the National Union of Students. Francis, who has become a whistleblower in recent years ... was part of the covert Metropolitan police unit, the Special Demonstration Squad (SDS), that monitored hundreds of political groups between 1968 and 2008. Francis gave a statement to a packed meeting in Parliament that marked the launch of a new book about the blacklisting of thousands of workers by multi-national construction firms. This month, the Daily Mirror revealed that one of the undercover officers in the SDS, Mark Jenner, posed as a joiner and was a member of the construction workers union, UCATT, for three years. Jenner’s involvement in trade unions is detailed here by the Undercover Research Group, a resource on covert infiltration of political groups. It describes how he attended meetings of UCATT and other unions, regularly went on pickets and ferried trade unionists to demonstrations. In his statement ... Francis said, ”Let me state very clearly that Mark Jenner was 100% one of my fellow undercover SDS police officers deployed alongside me in the 1990s.”

Note: While undercover, Mark Jenner had a four-year relationship with a woman who did not know his real identity. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing government corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.


Serious case review slams police failure in serial abuse of Oxford girls
2015-03-01, The Guardian (One of the UK's leading newspapers)
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/mar/01/gangs-abused-hundreds-of-oxfor...

More than 300 young people have been groomed and sexually exploited by gangs of men in Oxfordshire in the past 15 years, a damning report into the failures of police and social services to stop years of sexual torture, trafficking and rape will reveal, the Guardian has learned. The victims, mostly girls, come predominantly from the city of Oxford. A serious case review by the Oxfordshire safeguarding children’s board, to be published on Tuesday, will condemn Thames Valley police for not believing the young girls, for treating them as if they had chosen to adopt the lifestyle, and for failing to act on repeated calls for help. Oxfordshire social services – which had responsibility for the girls’ safety – will be equally damned for knowing they were being groomed and for failing to protect them despite compelling evidence they were in danger. One social worker told a trial that nine out of 10 of those responsible for the girls [were] aware of what was going on. The case echoes the child exploitation scandals in Rotherham, Rochdale and Derby. In Oxford, however, the grooming, sexual torture and trafficking took place on the streets of the Cowley area of the city, in churchyards, parks, a guesthouse and empty flats procured for the purpose of drugging the girls and handing them around to be gang raped and brutalised. Police officers and social workers did not listen to the girls when they spoke of the abuse they were suffering, did not believe them and dismissed them.

Note: If you think this is only a problem in the UK, read this disturbing article about the likely murder of Bill Bowen, a man who was about to complete a documentary exposing blatant, horrible abuses by the US's Child Protective Services that were covered up at high levels. Watch a revealing five-minute video presenting solid evidence that Child Protective Services is involved in organized U.S. child sex trafficking rings. See this webpage for more information. For solid evidence of a pedophile ring reaching to the highest levels of government, don't miss this powerful documentary and these sexual abuse new summaries.


How Police Unions and Arbitrators Keep Abusive Cops on the Street
2014-12-02, The Atlantic
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/12/how-police-unions-keep-ab...

When Frank Serpico, the most famous police whistleblower of his generation, reflected on years of law-enforcement corruption in the New York Police Department, he assigned substantial blame to a commissioner who failed to hold rank-and-file cops accountable. That's the classic template for police abuse: misbehaving cops are spared punishment by colleagues and bosses who cover for them. There are, of course, police officers who are fired for egregious misbehavior. Yet all over the U.S., police unions help many of those cops to get their jobs back, often via secretive appeals geared to protect labor rights rather than public safety. In practice, too many cops who needlessly kill people, use excessive force, or otherwise abuse their authority are getting reprieves from termination. In Oakland, California ... the San Jose Mercury News reports that "of the last 15 arbitration cases in which officers have appealed punishments, those punishments have been revoked in seven cases and reduced in five others." "In Philadelphia, an inquiry was recently completed on 26 cases where police officers were fired from charges ranging from domestic violence, to retail theft, to excessive force, to on duty intoxication," Adam Ozimek writes in a Forbes article on reforms to policing. "Shockingly, the Police Advisory Committee undertaking the investigation found that so far 19 of these fired officers have been reinstated.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing police corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.


Grenade launchers in schools? U.S. school police stock up on free military gear
2014-09-17, Toronto Star/Associated Press
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2014/09/17/grenade_launchers_in_schools_us_...

School police departments across the country have taken advantage of free military surplus gear, stocking up on mine resistant armoured vehicles, grenade launchers and scores of M16 rifles. At least 26 school districts across the country have participated in the Pentagon’s surplus program. Federal records show schools in California, Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Michigan, Nevada, Texas and Utah obtained surplus military gear. Nearly two dozen education and civil liberties groups sent a letter earlier this week to the Pentagon and the Justice and Education departments urging a stop to transfers of military weapons to school police. The Los Angeles Unified School District — the nation’s second-largest school district, enrolling more than 900,000 students — said in a statement this week that it would remove three grenade launchers it had acquired under the program in 2001 because they “are not essential life-saving items within the scope, duties and mission” of the district’s police force. But the district plans to keep 60 M16s and a MRAP, a military vehicle used in Iraq and Afghanistan that is built to withstand mine blasts. Los Angeles school board member Steve Zimmer said the district will likely also let go of the MRAP, too. The board was told of the specific equipment the district had received only after the protests last month in Ferguson, Zimmer said. Jill Poe, police chief in the Southern California’s Baldwin Park school district, said she’ll be returning the three M16 rifles acquired under her predecessor.

Note: For more on this, see concise summaries of deeply revealing government corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.


Aggressive police take hundreds of millions of dollars from motorists not charged with crimes
2014-09-06, Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2014/09/06/stop-and-seize/

The spread of an aggressive brand of policing ... has spurred the seizure of hundreds of millions of dollars in cash from motorists and others not charged with crimes. Thousands of people have been forced to fight legal battles that can last more than a year to get their money back. Behind the rise in seizures is a little-known cottage industry of private police-training firms that teach the techniques of “highway interdiction” to departments across the country. [It has] enabled police nationwide to share detailed reports about American motorists — criminals and the innocent alike — including their Social Security numbers, addresses and identifying tattoos, as well as hunches about which drivers to stop. A thriving subculture of road officers on the network now competes to see who can seize the most cash and contraband, describing their exploits in the network’s chat rooms and sharing “trophy shots” of money and drugs. Some police advocate highway interdiction as a way of raising revenue for cash-strapped municipalities. Unexplored until now is the role of the federal government and the private police trainers in encouraging officers to target cash on the nation’s highways. There have been 61,998 cash seizures made on highways and elsewhere since 9/11 without search warrants ... totaling more than $2.5 billion. State and local authorities kept more than $1.7 billion of that while Justice, Homeland Security and other federal agencies received $800 million. 298 departments and 210 task forces have seized the equivalent of 20 percent or more of their annual budgets since 2008. In 400 federal court cases examined by The Post where people who challenged seizures and received some money back, the majority were black, Hispanic or another minority.

Note: Watch an excellent spoof on this unbelievable police practice. For more on this, see concise summaries of deeply revealing government corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.


Bulger’s FBI Ties Enrage Cops
2011-10-21, Newsweek/Daily Beast
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/10/21/whitey-bulger-s-secret-deal-...

Three Massachusetts State Police officers once staked out organized-crime chief Whitey Bulger for months, all the while not knowing that he was an FBI informant who was tipped to their surveillance. James “Whitey” Bulger, now 82, is the Al Capone of Boston. A fugitive since 1995 who seemed untouchable, he is also compared to the “Teflon Don” of New York, John Gotti. His brother, Billy Bulger, was once the most powerful political figure in Massachusetts. "Whitey" was an FBI informant for decades while ruling the Irish organized-crime world. He made millions from rackets and drugs and committed an untold number of murders to keep his empire safe. On June 22, he was arrested in Santa Monica, California. The seizure of weapons and more than $800,000 in cash was no surprise. Recently, I spoke with three of the best—Bob Long, Rick Fraelick, and Jack O’Malley. Intrepid Bob Long was in charge. Bob Long says that if Bulger and Flemmi had not been protected by the FBI, “then ... nine murders would have never taken place. Long said he believes that Agents Morris and Connolly identified more than a dozen individuals to Bulger and Flemmi as FBI informants or could-be FBI informants and all of those people were killed. Connolly is now in prison; Morris received a grant of immunity for testimony.

Note: For lots more from major media sources on government corruption, click here.


Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police
2010-07-19, ABC News
http://abcnews.go.com/US/TheLaw/videotaping-cops-arrest/story?id=11179076

It wasn't his daredevil stunt [on his motorcycle] that has [Anthony Graber] facing the possibility of 16 years in prison. For that, he was issued a speeding ticket. It was the video that Graber posted on YouTube one week later -- taken with his helmet camera -- of a plainclothes state trooper cutting him off and drawing a gun during the traffic stop near Baltimore. In early April, state police officers raided Graber's parents' home in Abingdon, Md. They confiscated his camera, computers and external hard drives. Graber was indicted for allegedly violating state wiretap laws by recording the trooper without his consent. Arrests such as Graber's are becoming more common along with the proliferation of portable video cameras and cell-phone recorders. Videos of alleged police misconduct have become hot items on the Internet. YouTube still features Graber's encounter along with numerous other witness videos. "The message is clearly, 'Don't criticize the police,'" said David Rocah, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of Maryland who is part of Graber's defense team. "With these charges, anyone who would even think to record the police is now justifiably in fear that they will also be criminally charged." Carlos Miller, a Miami journalist who runs the blog "Photography Is Not a Crime," said he has documented about 10 arrests since he started keeping track in 2007. Miller himself has been arrested twice for photographing the police.

Note: To our knowledge, no one has ever been prosecuted for videotaping police doing good things, which they often do, yet many have been arrested for catching police doing bad things. Where's the justice here?


Police or provocateurs?
2010-03-18, The Guardian (One of the UK's leading newspapers)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/mar/18/undercover-police-infiltr...

Last Sunday's Observer claimed to expose how "an officer from a secretive unit of the Metropolitan police" worked "undercover among anti-racist groups in Britain, during which he routinely engaged in violence against members of the public and uniformed police officers to maintain his cover". Despite this sensationalist introduction, "Officer A" does not describe his involvement in any violent incidents. No wonder. The organisation he infiltrated, Youth Against Racism in Europe (YRE) is a peaceful organisation of young people, which in the 1990s organised mass protests against racism and the BNP [British National Party]. YRE [has often faced] violence from the far right, and unfortunately also from the police. The police not only used violence against [YRE] demonstrations but also carried out a secretive, unaccountable and clearly expensive infiltration operation. They gained nothing from it. Far from being secretive [YRE] publicly advertised [its] events. The Observer's revelation is not unique. Christopher Andrew's The Defence of the Realm: the Authorized History of M15, published last year, also describes state infiltration of Militant, the National Union of Miners and others. Surveillance of peaceful protestors has mushroomed. Police brutality also, as the tragic death of Ian Tomlinson showed, is not a thing of the past.

Note: Why would police place officers promoting violence in peaceful groups working against racism? Could it be that key elements within the police are racist?


Police in Ł9m scheme to log 'domestic extremists'
2009-10-25, The Guardian (One of the UK's leading newspapers)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/oct/25/police-domestic-extremists-database

Police are gathering the personal details of thousands of activists who attend political meetings and protests, and storing their data on a network of nationwide intelligence databases. The hidden apparatus has been constructed to monitor "domestic extremists". Detailed information about the political activities of campaigners is being stored on a number of overlapping IT systems, even if they have not committed a crime. Senior officers say domestic extremism, a term coined by police that has no legal basis, can include activists suspected of minor public order offences such as peaceful direct action and civil disobedience. Three national police units responsible for combating domestic extremism are run by the "terrorism and allied matters" committee of the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo). In total, it receives Ł9m in public funding, from police forces and the Home Office, and employs a staff of 100. The main unit, the National Public Order Intelligence Unit (NPOIU), runs a central database which lists thousands of so-called domestic extremists. It filters intelligence supplied by police forces across England and Wales, which routinely deploy surveillance teams at protests, rallies and public meetings. Vehicles associated with protesters are being tracked via a nationwide system of automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras. Police surveillance units, known as Forward Intelligence Teams (FIT) and Evidence Gatherers, record footage and take photographs of campaigners as they enter and leave openly advertised public meetings. Surveillance officers are provided with "spotter cards" used to identify the faces of target individuals who police believe are at risk of becoming involved in domestic extremism. Targets include high-profile activists regularly seen taking part in protests.

Note: This important article should be read in its entirety. For further revelations of the magnitude of this surveillance and "rebranding protest as extremism " program, click here.


Officers accused of inciting violence to testify before police ethics panel
2009-10-23, Globe and Mail (One of Canada's leading newspapers)
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/officers-accused-of-inciting-vio...

Three undercover officers accused of inciting protesters to attack riot police at the 2007 North American leaders summit in Montebello are being summoned to testify before Quebec's independent police ethics committee. The decision from the committee released this week overrules an independent review that exonerated the officers. It also comes more than two years after the black-clad trio were first exposed on YouTube. Dave Coles, the union leader who confronted the men at the time and filed a complaint against the police ... said he suspects an inquiry would find there was political involvement. “This is the big question: Who sent them in?” asked Mr. Coles. “And don't give me some lame excuse that it was a low-level officer.” Video images of the incident posted on YouTube showed three officers disguised as protesters wearing black tops and camouflage pants. Their faces were covered by black and white bandanas. One of them, wearing a sideways ball cap marked with graffiti, held a large stone in his hand. Mr. Coles yelled at them to show their faces and the officer carrying the rock responded with a two-handed shove.

Note: Click on the link above to watch the astonishing YouTube video of this police provocation. This is just one case that happened to be caught on film. Why are undercover police infiltrating activist groups and inciting violence at demonstrations around the world?


Important Note: Explore our full index to revealing excerpts of key major media news articles on several dozen engaging topics. And don't miss amazing excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.

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