U.S. Soldier Captured in Afghanistan
July 2, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
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Insurgents have captured an American soldier in eastern Afghanistan, the U.S. military said Thursday.
Spokeswoman Capt. Elizabeth Mathias said the soldier went missing Tuesday.
“We are using all of our resources to find him and provide for his safe return,” Mathias said.
Mathias did not provide details on the soldier, the location where he was captured or the circumstances.
“We are not providing further details to protect the soldier’s well-being,” she said.
An Afghan police official said the soldier went missing during the day Tuesday in the Mullakheil area of eastern Paktika province. Gen. Nabi Mullakheil said there is an American base in the area.
Iran Claims Newsweek Reporter Confessed
July 2, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
A reporter for Newsweek magazine who was arrested in Tehran has confessed to doing the bidding of Western governments, the semi-official Fars News Agency reported Wednesday.
Newsweek says Maziar Bahari has been reporting for years without bias and beyond reproach.
Maziar Bahari, 42, made his alleged confession at a news conference Tuesday. Because international journalists have been limited in their ability to gather news in Iran, CNN has not been able to confirm the agency report.
Fars reported that the Canadian-Iranian reporter who had worked for the BBC and England’s Channel 4 network admitted having filed false reports for Newsweek during the elections — a charge the magazine rejected.
“He has been reporting for years without any possible hint of bias and beyond reproach,” Newsweek Paris Bureau Chief Chris Dickey told CNN. “We think he’s one of the best reporters in the business.”
He called the report “preposterous.”
Dickey said Bahari had not been allowed to speak with a lawyer or with his family since his arrest on June 21.
California Terror Informant Faces Deportation
July 1, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
He’s a Pakistani immigrant who helped the United States in the war on terror, but now the U.S. government wants to deport him. His lawyers are working furiously to try to allow him to stay in his adopted country.
The man, who wants to remain unidentified, said he put himself in harm’s way by working as an undercover informant in California for ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, searching out terrorist connections.
He said ICE agents told him if he worked for ICE, he could stay here indefinitely or even get a green card.
The former informant is originally from Karachi, Pakistan and has lived in the US for over 20 years, first as a student and then as a white-collar professional. But now he faces deportation back to Pakistan.
“I thought I had a chance to live here without being deported or you know that’s what they told me, (ICE agents) said if I work with them as an informant I will be able to stay in this country indefinitely,” he said.
ICE agents approached him in 2004 after he was charged with overstaying his legal visa and suggested there was another way to stay in the United States.
“They told me if I helped them they would get me a green card, but later on they changed their statement and they said I can stay in the United States indefinitely, you know,” the informant said in describing those events.
In exchange, the agents wanted him to work as a confidential informant, to help crack the case of a Fresno paralegal named Akram Sabar Chaudhry, who the agents said was filing false asylum claims for immigrants.
Tennis Ball Bomber Denies Terrorism Charges – UK
June 30, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
A “bigoted and racist” neo-Nazi was planning to use tennis ball shrapnel bombs in a hate campaign against Asians, a court heard today . Neil Lewington, was said to have been on the brink of a bombing spree when he was “fortuitously” arrested for being drunk and disorderly at a Suffolk railway station.
Police found he was carrying two home-made fire bombs in a holdall, the Old Bailey heard. In a raid on the 43-year-old’s home in Tilehurst, Berkshire, which he shared with his parents, police found a bomb factory, it was alleged. Lewington denies eight charges under anti-terrorism and explosives laws.
Planned Racial Violence Spurs Lockdown By Sherriff Arpaio
June 29, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
Ten thousand inmates in Maricopa County jails were placed on lockdown after authorities got word of a planned race riot.
The lockdown means visitation, phone calls and nonessential movement will be restricted and SWAT teams will be on standby, according to Lt. Brian Lee, sheriff’s spokesman.
Inmates will be allowed out of their cells for court appearances only.
Lee said in a press release that the planned riot was spurred by the inmates’ dislike of sharing cells with people of other races.
The lockdown will continue until tensions subside.
Detonated Blasting Cap Found On Tracks Near Train Station
June 29, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
Wenham Mass. Kids looking for rocks along the train tracks yesterday made a puzzling discovery: a detonated blasting cap on the tracks near the commuter rail station.
The discovery temporarily shut down a section of the parking lot near the Shoppes at Hamilton Crossing and police made a passing train continue to the Ipswich station without stopping.
Police Sgt. Jeffrey Tobey said there was no evidence of any explosive material on the tracks or else they would have shut down the Newburyport line.
In fact, the detonated blasting cap wasn’t even on the tracks anymore.
Tobey said the two kids brought their discovery to the Hamilton police station down the road.
Hamilton police contacted MBTA police who are now working with the FBI on an investigation, Tobey said.
via Detonated blasting cap found on tracks near train station – SalemNews.com, Salem, MA.
Yemeni Jet Crashes Near Comoros Islands – 150 Onboard
June 29, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
A Yemeni airliner with 150 people aboard has crashed near the Comoros Islands, an aviation official in Yemen says.
An airliner with 150 people on board belonging to Yemeni state carrier Yemenia Air crashed in the Indian Ocean archipelago of Comoros Tuesday, a senior government official said.
“We don’t know if there are any survivors among the 150 people on the plane,” Comoros vice-president Idi Nadhoim told Reuters from the airport at the main island’s capital Moroni.
Nadhoim said the accident happened in the early hours of Tuesday, but could not give any more details.
The location was not immediately known, but a medical worker in the town of Mitsamiouli, on the main island Grande Comore, said he had been called into the local hospital.
“They have just called me to come to the hospital. They said a plane had crashed,” he told Reuters.
A Comoran police source said the plane was believed to have come down in the sea. “We really have no sea rescue capabilities,” he added.
Twin Brothers Indicted in Mail Bombing of Arizona Diversity Office
June 26, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
Twin brothers have been indicted in a 2004 mail bombing that injured the diversity director of the Arizona city of Scottsville.
Dennis and Daniel Mahon are charged with conspiracy to damage buildings and property by means of explosive, according to an indictment unsealed Thursday and filed June 16 in federal court.
The indictment says the brothers, who live in Illinois, intended to “promote racial discord” on behalf of the White Aryan Resistance.
The package detonated in Don Logan’s hands on Feb. 26, 2004, in the city’s Human Resources Complex. Logan oversaw diversity issues for city employees and citizens, including racial and sex discrimination. The blast injured Logan’s hand and arm. A secretary also was injured, and both spent about a week in the hospital.
Authorities arrested the brothers in their Davis Junction, Illinois, home and say they had assault weapons, hundreds of rounds of ammunition and white supremacist material.
Alleged ETA Terror Members Arrested Gathering Intel – Paris
June 25, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
Two alleged senior members of the armed Basque separatist organisation ETA accused of gathering intelligence on future targets were arrested near Paris on Thursday, officials said.
Javier Arruabarrena Carlos, 37, and Ohiane Garmendia Marin, 32, were arrested at Charenton-le-pont, a southeastern suburb of Paris, and officers were carrying out a search of their home, a police source said.
The suspects — a man and a woman — were described as “two main members of ETA’s intelligence wing,” by Spanish Secretary of State for the Interior Antonio Camacho who praised the “effective collaboration” between the French and Spanish authorities which led to the arrests.
Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba told parliament the pair were responsible for gathering intelligence on future targets.
He said, however, that it was “unlikely” that they were involved in a car bomb which killed a police inspector last Friday in Spain’s Basque region.
French investigators had seized computers during their search of the suspects’ home, said Rubalcaba, adding that it had been a “good week” for security forces battling the organisation.
al-Qaeda Kills US Missionary For Spreading Christianity
June 25, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
A friend of the Cleveland, Tenn., missionary shot to death Tuesday in Africa said he will withhold judgment about the claim that terrorist group al-Quaida was responsible for the killing until it can be validated.
“Maybe it is true, maybe it isn’t,” said the Rev. Jim Gibson, co-pastor of First Baptist Church of Cleveland, where Christopher Ervin Leggett was a member. “I don’t think it would be very wise to address that until either it can be confirmed as true or false.”
A branch of terrorist group al-Qaida on Thursday claimed responsibility for the death of Mr. Leggett, who was shot several times by unidentified gunmen.
Arab satellite TV station Al-Jazeera said it received an audio statement from al-Qaida’s North Africa branch in which the group said it killed the 39-year-old for trying to convert Muslims to Christianity in Nouakchott, Mauritania, according to The Associated Press.
“Two knights of the Islamic Maghreb succeeded Tuesday morning at 8 a.m. to kill the infidel American Christopher Leggett for his Christianizing activities,” the group said in the statement.
The authenticity of the statement could not be independently verified.
Mauritania’s Interior Ministry said Thursday it was investigating the death, and security forces were doing “all they can to catch the criminals.”
Mr. Gibson said the family is coping as best it can under the circumstances and appreciates the love and support of friends.
8 Children Burned In Homemade Acid-Bomb Attack
June 23, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
Two children suffered serious burns and six others were injured after someone threw a bottle containing dangerous chemicals at them while they played outside over the weekend in Brooklyn.
The incident happened about 8 p.m. on Sunday at S. 8th Street in the Williamsburg section of the borough. One of the victims, 10-year-old Yaakov Frankel, along with several witnesses told police that someone ran out of a building across the street from the courtyard where children were playing and tossed the homemade device at them. An explosion that released some sort of Drano-type mix got into the eyes of Frankel and a 12-year-old girl, causing them to be hospitalized. Six other children suffered burns and were treated at the scene.
“They were playing and all of a sudden a bottle came in with liquid, and it spins around and exploded into their eyes and [onto] the clothes of the kids,” said.
Man Threatens To Crash Plane, Shoot Police – Phoenix
June 23, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
Police are looking for a man who allegedly threatened to crash a plane and shoot police on Tuesday morning.
Detective James Holmes with the Phoenix Police Department said the suspect was being picked up by State Mental health authorities when he made the threats.
Deer Valley Airport was placed on lockdown while officers searched the airport.
Holmes said the man was known to shower at Phoenix Country Club.
The club and the man’s home were also searched, but officers did not find him.
The man is believed to be either on foot or in a car.
Pensioners Kidnap, Torture Financial Advisor Who Lost £2m
June 23, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
Pensioners battered a financial adviser with Zimmer frames before kidnapping and torturing him for losing £2million of their savings.
James Amburn, 56, was ambushed outside his home in Speyer, western Germany, bound with masking tape and bundled into a car boot.
‘It took them quite a while because they ran out of breath,’ said Mr Amburn, who was driven to the Bavarian lakeside home of one of the gang.
Another couple, retired doctors, joined the kidnappers in the cellar where Mr Amburn was chained and tortured for four days last week.
The alleged kidnapping is the latest example of what is being dubbed “silver crime” — the violent backlash of pensioners who feel cheated by the world.
“As I was letting myself into my front door I was assaulted from behind and hit hard,” the financial adviser James Amburn, said. “Then they bound me with masking tape until I looked like a mummy. I thought I was a dead man.”
He was freed by 40 heavily armed policemen from the counter-terrorist unit last Saturday. The frightened consultant was in his underwear, his body lacerated by wounds allegedly inflicted by angry pensioners.
It appears that two couples had entrusted Mr Amburn’s investment company with €2.4 million (£2 million), which he ploughed into Florida’s boom-and-bust property market. The properties became forfeit during the sub-prime mortgage crisis but the couples wanted their money back.
After being bundled into the boot of an Audi in the west German town of Speyer, Mr Amburn was driven southwards to Chieming, close to the Austrian border, where one of the couples Roland K, and his wife, Sieglinde, 79, had a holiday home.
People On Terror Watch List Allowed To Buy Guns
June 22, 2009 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
When people on the government’s terrorist watch list have tried to buy guns or explosives in recent years, the government has let them the vast majority of the time. That’s the finding of a new report by the Government Accountability Office, sent to lawmakers last month and released publicly Monday.
From February 2004 to February 2009, 963 background checks using the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System “resulted in valid matches with terrorist watch list records; of these matches, approximately 90 percent were allowed to proceed because the checks revealed no prohibiting information,” the GAO report says. About 10 percent were denied.
“Under current law, there is no basis to automatically prohibit a person from possessing firearms or explosives because they appear on the terrorist watch list,” wrote the GAO’s director of homeland security and justice issues, Eileen R. Larence.
“Rather, there must be a disqualifying factor (i.e., prohibiting information) pursuant to federal or state law, such as a felony conviction or illegal immigration status.”
Of the 963 background checks, 865 were allowed to proceed, and 98 were denied, the report said.
People on terrorist watch list allowed to buy guns – CNN.com
