113-Year-Old Man Says These 5 Foods Keep Him Alive

Meet Bernando LaPallo.  He is 113 years old as of August 17th, 2014 with the body of an 80 year old. He has never been sick a day in his life, goes for a walk every morning and eats mostly organic fruits and vegetables. He has a recipe for longevity that he learned from his father, who was a doctor who lived to be 98.

According to his website, Bernando feels better than ever. “I feel great,” he says. “I feel wonderful. It’s all about obedience and moderation. That’s the story. The key to my success has been obedience and moderation. I have been doing everything my daddy told me to do all these years. Obedience is the key. Moderation is the back up.”

On his 110th birthday, a local news station did a story on Bernando and he revealed the top five foods that have kept him alive this long:

1. Garlic

2. Honey

3. Cinnamon

4. Chocolate

5. Olive Oil

“Whenever I’m asked a question about what I do to live so long, I tell them ‘I know you’ve heard the saying, You are what you eat,'” confessed Bernando. “My dad told me not to eat ordinary red meat. He said lamb is okay. But stay away from hot dogs, french fries. Don’t eat them.”

Check This Out: Have Diabetes? Here’s Help…For FREE!

He also keeps his mind sharp by being a voracious reader and solving crossword puzzles and playing checkers. He goes around the country doing speaking engagements and even shares some of his recipes here.

Link : http://blackdoctor.org/452589/113-year-old-man-says-these-5-foods-keep-him-alive/

Racism In The United States By The Numbers!

On average, black men's prison sentences are 20% longer than white men's for comparable crimes 
On average, black men's prison sentences are 20% longer than white men's for comparable crimes 
African Americans are far more likely to be stopped and searched (although the contraband hit rate is higher among white people) in California 
Those wrongfully convicted and later exonerated by DNA are disproportionately African American 

Defense Bill Passes, Giving Sacred Native American Sites To Mining Company

WASHINGTON -- The U.S. Senate passed a measure authorizing the nation’s defense programs Friday, and along with it managed to give lands sacred to Native Americans to a foreign company that owns a uranium mine with Iran.

The $585 billion National Defense Authorization Act of 2015 is one of the must-pass pieces of legislation that Congress moves every year. But like they did in attaching extraneous riders to the must-pass government funding bill, lawmakers used the defense bill as a vehicle to pass a massive public lands package.

The bill sailed through on a vote of 89 to 11.

Many of the land measures were popular. But one, the Southeast Arizona Land Exchange and Conservation Act, had twice failed to win support in the House of Representatives, blocked both by conservationists and conservatives.

The deal gives a subsidiary of the Australian-English mining firm Rio Tinto 2,400 acres of the Tonto National Forest in exchange for several other parcels so it can minea massive copper deposit.

The Iran connection comes from a uranium mine in Namibia, in which Tehran has owned a 15 percent stake since the days of the shah.

Rio Tinto, which removed Iran’s two members of the mine board in 2012, has argued that Iran gets no benefit from the property, that there is no active partnership, and that it has discussed the issue with the U.S. State Department to ensure that no sanctions against Iran are violated.

A State Department spokesperson confirmed that officials had discussed the site, but declined to say that they could assure there were no violations of sanctions.

“We are aware of the mine in question and have discussed relevant compliance issues with the company,” the spokesperson said.

The official also declined to say if, as might be expected, Iran would be able to benefit from the mine if Secretary of State John Kerry is successful in negotiations to limit the regime’s nuclear aspirations, and sanctions are lifted. “We are not going to speculate on any hypotheticals,” the official said. A Rio Tinto official also declined to speculate, but noted that under the current sanctions and Namibian law, it's impossible to buy out Iran's share or sever the tie.

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) mounted a bid to strip the entire lands package from the bill, but secured only 18 votes in his favor.

It’s not only people concerned about any benefit Iran might get who were worried about giving American forest land to a foreign firm that has such a connection.

Native Americans, particularly the Apache tribe in the area, say digging a massive mine under their ancestral lands will destroy sacred ceremonial and burial grounds.

Rio Tinto says it will work closely with the tribes to ensure their concerns are heard, and will work with the U.S. Forest Service to protect the environment.

The measure was added into the NDAA largely thanks to the efforts of Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), who, along with fellow Arizona Republican Sen. Jeff Flake, sees the project as an economic boon that will create 3,700 jobs over several decades.

Flake acknowledged that the deal never would have passed on its own, even as he lamented the process that got it through the Senate.

“It’s never good to see big packages with so many things in them -- that’s what we want to get away from,” Flake said. “But it’s been very difficult to move individual pieces of legislation over the last few years.”

In this case, the addition of the Arizona swap and the other land measures were never discussed in public, and were added during secret negotiations between the House and Senate Armed Services Committee. the deal was never publicly revealed until the House started work on passing the entire defense bill last week.

It will become law as soon as President Barack Obama signs it. Rio Tinto, though subsidiary Resolution Copper, will take possession of the land a year later. Although the land will then be private property and federal environmental reviews will no longer be enforceable, the company said in a statement after the measure passed that it would abide by such reviews. It also pledged to be a good neighbor:

“Resolution Copper Mining is pleased that the Southeast Arizona Land Exchange and Conservation Act passed the House of Representatives and the Senate with strong bipartisan support. Passage of the legislation means that Resolution Copper can move forward with the development of this world-class ore body which will create approximately 3,700 jobs, generate over $60 billion in economic impact and result in almost $20 billion in state and federal tax payments,” said project director Andrew Taplin.

"There is much more work to be done before commercial mining can begin and Resolution Copper looks forward to working with all stakeholders as we continue to progress through the regulatory review process toward responsible development and operation of a world-class copper mine that will safely produce over 25 percent of the current annual demand for copper in the United States.”

Once the legislation is signed into law by President Obama, Resolution Copper will focus on the comprehensive environmental and regulatory review under NEPA, where there will be broad public consultation, government-to-government consultation with Arizona Native American tribes and a comprehensive valuation appraisal of the copper deposit as required by Congress.

Resolution Copper plans to work to expand existing partnerships and create new ones with neighboring communities and Native American Tribes. The company will endeavor to hire locally and regionally whenever possible.

The heart of the legislation is the exchange of 2,400 acres of federally owned land above the copper deposit for 5,300 acres of land owned by Resolution Copper composed of valuable recreational, conservation and culturally significant land throughout Arizona. Congressional leaders made significant improvements to the legislation to address community, environmental and tribal concerns. These changes include provisions for completion of a full Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) prior to the exchange of title, extraordinary protections for historic Apache Leap, and safe access to the Oak Flat Campground after the exchange has been completed.

Link:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/12/12/defense-bill-passes-rio-tinto_n_6317946.html

Emails and Racist Chats Show How Cops and GOP Are Teaming Up to Undermine de Blasio

Threats seem to expose a political plot against the NYC mayor and the BlackLivesMatter movement.

December 29, 2014  |  

When hundreds of cops from around the country and as far away as Canada turned their backs on New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio during the funeral of Officer Rafael Ramos, the NYPD officer shot to death alongside his partner Wenjian Liu by a deranged gunman, they fired the first salvo in a carefully coordinated political operation aimed at discrediting the liberal mayor and shattering the ongoing anti-police brutality protest movement. 

AlterNet has obtained emails revealing plans to organize a series of anti-de Blasio protests around the city until the summer of 2015. Billed as a non-partisan movement in support of “the men and women of the NYPD,” the protests are being orchestrated by a cast of NYPD union bosses and local Republican activists allied with Rudy Giuliani, the former mayor who recentlycalled on de Blasio to “say you’re sorry to [NYPD officers] for having created a false impression of them.” The first rally is planned to take place at Queens Borough Hall at noon on January 13.  

Joe Concannon, a failed Republican State Senate candidate and current president of the Tea Party-aligned Queens Village Republican Club, is the main organizer of the burgeoning anti-de Blasio protest effort. The retired NYPD captain and former Giuliani advisor is a close ally of Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association president Patrick Lynch. Lynch generated national headlines — and cheers from rank and file cops — when he claimed that de Blasio “has blood on [his] hands” just hours after Ismaaiyl Brinsley murdered Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu.

In an email exchange with a supporter, Concannon said he and his allies had filed papers to found a non-profit to fund the anti-de Blasio campaign. The January 13 Queens demonstration would be among the largest, according to Concannon. Major rallies in March in Breezy Point, Queens and at City Hall were also in the works, he said.

In a separate email dated December 26 and titled, “Support Your Police rallies,” Concannon declared the onset of a campaign he dubbed Operation All Out. “Everyone MUST get out and support these fine men and women,” he implored several NYPD associates. 

Jack Coughlin, the treasurer of the NYPD Superior Officers Association, responded by proposing “a rally held in Breezy Point in March when the weather will be better [that] could attract thousands of pro-cop supporters to counter the professional anti-cop organizers.” Coughlin went on to urge Concannon to pressure Republican representatives Peter King and Lee Zeldin and NY GOP State Chairman Ed Cox to “get the House Homeland Committee to hold public hearings on who's financing Al Sharpton's anti-cop protest.”

National Police Defense Foundation executive director Joseph Occhipinti chimed in to offer help in coordinating the demonstrations. “I would suggest that everything go through the [Patrick Lynch’s Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association] for any organized protests,” he added. A former agent of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, Occhipinti was convicted in 1991 of conducting illegal searches and narrowly escaped jail time for allegedly stealing $16,000 from his victims. When the US attorney who secured his conviction, Jeh Johnson, was appointed by Obama to direct the Department of Homeland Security last year, Occhipinti rushed to the right-wing writer Charles C. Johnson to complain.

The anger coursing through the ranks of the NYPD is driving union bosses like Lynch to ratchet up their rhetoric against the mayor. Lynch is up for election soon and seems desperate to channel the resentment of his constituents. Meanwhile, Republican operatives see a chance to do fatal damage to a rising Democratic star and close Clinton ally by resurrecting the kind of racial backlash politics that won them urban white votes during the Nixon era. 

Not since the early 1970s, when liberal mayor John Lindsay presided over a politically chaotic and crime-ridden New York, has a mayor been so reviled by the NYPD. With an African-American wife with a history of liberal activism and a biracial son who played a pivotal role in his campaign for mayor, de Blasio has become, at least for some cops, a symbol of everything they despise about the city they patrol. Though some officers support de Blasio's calls to reform the NYPD -- particularly Latino and black cops -- there seems to be no organized force within the department capable of obstructing the campaign against the Mayor.

A cursory glance at message boards on a semi-private police chat forum suggests that opposition to de Blasio within NYPD ranks has descended into raw racial paranoia. 

NYPD Officers, In Their Own Words

On Thee Rant, a popular chat site known to be an online watercooler for active duty and retired NYPD officers, commenters fret about possible ambushes by black gang members, obsess over radical leftists, organize boycotts of chain stores and a Chipotle outlet they deem “anti-cop,” and hatch plots to target protest leaders. While the forum attracts a disproportionate number of cops with a proclivity for outrageous hyperventilation, it also offers a rare look at the unvarnished views of the retired police activists and old guard officers mobilizing against the mayor. 

As veteran NYPD observer Len Levitt wrote of the forum, officers “are often so constricted by the department that Thee Rant is often their only outlet. That’s good, until it isn’t.”

In comment threads, de Blasio is routinely referred to as “Kaiser Wilhelm,” a derisive reference to his birth name, Warren Wilhelm Jr. Police resentment of de Blasio has simmered since his campaign for mayor, when he ran against Bloomberg’s stop-and-frisk policies. The anti-de Blasio sentiment grew during the early months of his term, as he wrangled with the Policemen's Benevolent Association (PBA) over police salaries and dropped a Bloomberg appeal of a federal lawsuit that found NYPD officers unfairly targeted people of color with stop-and-frisk tactics.

But nothing fueled NYPD outrage like de Blasio’s relationship with Al Sharpton. When the mayor hired a former Sharpton aide, Rachel Noerdlinger, as the chief of staff to his wife, Chirlane McCray, then defended Noerdlinger against atorrent of bad press for her relationship with an ex-convict and her son’s Facebook postings referring to cops as “pigs,” NYPD anger exploded.

On a Thee Rant forum, commenters homed in on Noerdlinger’s race (she is black) and her gender. While one commenter described her as “a weed soaked cum dumpster low life POS,” another officer wrote of her and her partner: “The bit-ch will be bugging mofo's ass, if she hasn't done so already, about making nigge-r noise in court and he will begin clobbering her, and then junior will jump in and snap his neck!”

“They're born N I _ _ E R S , live like N I _ _ E R S and usually die like N I _ _ E R S,” a police commenter added. His language was typical of commentary appearing on the forum whenever Noerdlinger's name was mentioned. 

When de Blasio remarked this month that he had instructed his son, Dante, to use extra caution when engaging with cops, Thee Rant commenters lit up the chat boards. In a typically lurid thread, a Thee Rant commenter made light of the struggle de Blasio’s daughter, Chiara, has waged with substance abuse. “Somebody should slip her a ‘hot bag,’” a fellow officer who called himself Thisroundsoneme replied, suggesting a cop plant drugs on her to frame her for possession.

A Staten Island grand jury’s refusal to indict Officer Daniel Pantaleo for strangling Eric Garner to death was not only a cause for celebration at Thee Rant, but an excuse for a new wave of racist tirades. “F u c k  Black America, their equal or worse than whites, when speaking of Racism…" wrote Eddie R, a forum commenter. “F u c k  Diversity, it's not working and never will work…” 

“The latinos are about 24 percent of the population as opposed to the 13 percent that negroes comprise. Perhaps that is why our 'brethren of color' are using any excuse to act up,” another NYPD commenter added.

When the killing of Ramos and Liu was first reported, Thee Rant commenters leapt to blame de Blasio, and for the first time, focused their loathing on Bratton. “Allowing these savage animals to get away with the SHYT they are is the reason this happened. The blood is on your hands Mr Mayor and You Police Commissioner Bratton,” a forum member declared, foreshadowing remarks by the PBA’s Lynch. 

NYPD Commissioner Bratton has emerged in recent weeks as a hate figure on Thee Rant forums. The angry cops have dubbed him "Beansy," mocking his thick Boston accent and deriding him as a hyper-ambitious, imperious technocrat who has served as a political stage prop for the liberal de Blasio. While one forum commenter called for a PBA vote of no confidence for both de Blasio and Bratton, another waxed nostalgic for Ray Kelly, the former commissioner whose legacy was defined by his defense of stop-and-frisk. “The difference between Kelly and Bratton is Kelly, for better or for worse ran the Department while Bratton holds DeBlasio's coat,” a commenter who called himself Petefio wrote.

As the demonstrations against police brutality spread, some Thee Rant commenters vowed to target protest organizers like Jose LaSalle, an activist with Copwatch who documents police abuses in the Bronx. “Jose hates white people!” wrote a commenter who identified himself as a former member of the NYPD and went by the handle, Retirednutjob. “What a shock! Why don't he go back to Puerto Rico? Go harass the Police down there Jose and see what happens!”

The ex-cop went on to post what he said was LaSalle’s home phone number and suggested a campaign to force him out of his job with the New York City Parks Department. “Come on we are a powerful force of retired investigators and private eyes and various other sources, lets start following and watching these !%@% stirrers it cant be that hard to find dirt and discredit these azzholes,” Baysidedet clamored.

From #TurnYourBack to Operation All Out

At the Woodhull Hospital in Brooklyn where Ramos and Liu were pronounced dead on December 20, the PBA and Sergeants Benevolent Association received word that de Blasio was on his way. It was the police union bosses’ chance to embrace the raw rage of the beat cops they represented. When the mayor arrived, proceeding down a long hallway past a line of officers, the cops turned their backs to him in a show of total contempt.

“That blood on the hands starts on the steps of City Hall in the office of the mayor,” the PBA’s Lynch proclaimed afterwards. “When these funerals are over, those responsible will be called on the carpet and held accountable.” 

The following day, actor James Woods seized on the protest to popularize a hashtag on Twitter: #TurnYourBack. Woods’ first tweet, published just hours after the spontaneous protest took place, has been retweeted more than 2500 times.

Click to enlarge.

Woods is one of the Tea Party right's favorite celebrities and happens to be a friend and golfing partner of Rudy Giuliani. In fact, Woods played the former NYC mayor in the forgotten post-9/11 biopic, Rudy. “I fought tooth and nail to portray him as the genuine hero that I unequivocally believe him to be,” Woods said at the time.

With help from Woods and Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post and Fox News Channel, where Giuliani blamedthe Mayor for “bringing [police protests] on himself,” the NYPD’s war on de Blasio became a flashpoint for the national partisan battle. The stage was set for an epic rebuke of de Blasio.

Nearly 700 cops from around the country and Canada descended on New York City for the December 27 funeral of the murdered officer Rafael Ramos, taking advantage of an offer from Jet Blue of free flights to the memorial. Among those represented at the ceremony were members of the Albuquerque Police Department, a scandal-stained force with the highest rate of shootings of unarmed civilians in the country.

As soon as de Blasio appeared on a large screen monitor positioned outside the church where the funeral took place, cops who may never have heard the mayor’s name responded to the cue to turn their backs. “100% including Volunteer FD guys from Long Island and Cops from everywhere from Canadian Mounties to San Diego and San Francisco, and everywhere in between [turned their backs],” recalled Thee Rant member Thisroundsonme. “Even civilians in the rear behind the detail turned their backs as word spread as to what was going on.”

Another cop put the protest in perspective: “This was a show of solidarity for the Police nationwide. Cops everywhere are under attack by the public they protect, and the politicians who should be supporting their Police are derelict in their duties... And this is what you get.”

Officer Liu’s funeral on January 3 will present police with one more opportunity to admonish de Blasio. Then Operation All Out begins, with Republican operatives hoping to ride out of the political wilderness on the rising tide of cop rage. In an email to a supporter, Queens Village Republican Club president Joe Concannon referred to the planned wave of protests as “our plan to keep it in the news for the first half of 2015.”

Link : http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/exposed-how-republicans-and-cops-are-teaming-take-down-deblasio?paging=off&current_page=1#bookmark

Paulie Malignaggi Blows up and goes off on Manny Pacquiao

Goldie Taylor Doesn’t Hold Back!

Goldie Taylor, journalist and author born in East St. Louis, is well known for exploring the roots of poverty, gun violence and environmental justice. Watch below as she speaks out against the systematic racism and inequalities that exist in society. Powerful!

Rudy Giuliani’s daughter busted for shoplifting at Sephora

CUFF DAY: A cop leads a handcuffed Caroline Giuliani out of the East 86th Street Sephora yesterday, toting a bag of evidence. She was released hours later.Photo: Lawrence Schwartzwald

The daughter of former tough-on-crime Mayor Rudy Giuliani was busted yesterday for pilfering products from a trendy cosmetics store near her Upper East Side home, police said.

Caroline Giuliani, 20, a theater student at Harvard, was caught on security cameras at Sephora on East 86th Street allegedly stuffing makeup into her jacket pocket shortly before 2 p.m.

She was confronted by a sales clerk and a store security guard, who called cops.

Sources said she allegedly stole five items, worth slightly more than $100. She had about $320 on her, they added.

As security waited for cops, Caroline handed over her ID and said, “I’m an actress,” a police source said. When asked if she was related to the former mayor, she replied, “Yes, I’m his daughter.”

At that point, store managers had a change of heart — but it was too late.

The daughter of the man credited with slashing crime in New York City was hauled out in handcuffs in an NYU shirt and taken to the 19th Precinct station house. She was charged with petit larceny and released last night with a desk-appearance ticket and a future court date.

“Once we review the case, we will decide whether or not to file a criminal complaint,” said Erin Duggan, a spokeswoman for Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance Jr. Caroline flashed an uncomfortable smirk as she left the station house in a red cardigan sweater, black sweatpants and white sneakers with no laces. Her clearly upset mother, former TV reporter Donna Hanover, was at her side.

Caroline’s arrest stunned Sephora shoppers.

“She passed by and she didn’t say anything. Her head was down,” said Dominic Zawada, 25, who was in the store during the arrest. “They [cops] were holding her really tight.”

Detectives rummaged through her bag while she was being led out.

A Sephora spokeswoman, Jodi Balkan, declined to comment on the arrest.

Rudy Giuliani, who did not come to the station house, said through a spokeswoman, “This is a personal matter, and Mayor Giuliani asks the media to respect the privacy of his daughter at this time.”

Caroline Giuliani, a self-described liberal, drew headlines in 2008 when she slapped her GOP presidential-candidate father in the face by throwing her support behind Barack Obama on her Facebook page.

Since her father’s public divorce from Hanover and his marriage to Judith Nathan, the ex-mayor’s relationship with Caroline and his son, Andrew, has been strained.

Caroline, in fact, has shunned her famous last name. Two years ago, a Harvard alumni mag referred to her as Caroline Hanover, and her Facebook page lists her as Caroline Rose G.

Link : http://nypost.com/2010/08/05/rudy-giulianis-daughter-busted-for-shoplifting-at-sephora/

Cop Handcuffs and Beats African American Military Police Officer

An Orlando police officer is being scrutinized after he illegally arrested and beat a military veteran. The entire Orlando Police Department is now being investigated along with Orlando Police Officer, William Escobar, after it was determined that they purposely withheld evidence from the State Attorney’s Office relevant to the assault by Officer Escobar.

The body cam video from Officer Escobar clearly showed him beating a military police officer who was in handcuffs and on the ground throughout the entire ordeal: unable to resist. To top things off, the handcuffing and arrest itself was illegal.

During the beating, the Escobar can be heard yelling: “I am a cop, you understand you stupid motherf**ker.”

All of this occurred back in March, when officers responded to a disturbance call. The police claimed that they could “smell marijuana” in the air when they arrived.

One of the responding officers, Officer Williams said, “I am familiar with the odor of cannabis due to my training and experience in street level drugs.”

But an investigation determined there was never any marijuana at the scene.

Officer Williams also claimed to have seen the silhouette of a handgun in the pocket of one of the suspects, Verrell Sheals. There was no handgun.

While officers illegally arrested Sheals, Refus Jerome Holloway – another at the scene – “charged” allegedly with his hands in his pockets.

But in actuality Holloway was reaching for and then holding up his military ID, to let the officers know that he was a military police officer.

All witnesses at the scene have said that Holloway had his hands up and was trying to show his ID to the police officers, so that he could ask why his cousin, Sheals was being arrested.

Officer Williams then drew his gun and aimed it at Holloway, following with a front kick to the military cop’s abdomen. But Holloway caught the slow kick and immediately released it once he saw that the officer was losing his balance.

Officer Williams sprayed and entire canister of tear gas spray in Holloway’s face, along with another innocent bystander who had nothing to do with any of these events.

Once on the ground, Officer Escobar handcuffed Holloway and began punching and kicking him in the back of the head, yelling: “I am a cop, you understand you stupid mother f**ker.”

The video records Holloway pleading: “I didn’t touch you, I didn’t touch you.”

Watch the video below:

The State Attorney drop all charges against Holloway once this video surfaced, as it contradicted everything in the official police story. But when prosecutors saw the body cam video, they realized that Escobar had written a sworn testimony that there was no body cam video.

Officer Escobar has been investigated a full eight times for similar actions. While the State Attorney’s office says that their investigation into the officer is ongoing, Escobar has been cleared each of the eight times he was investigated in the past.

Link : http://countercurrentnews.com/2014/12/cop-handcuffs-and-beats-african-american-military-police-officer/

War Crimes Case Filed in Germany Bush Jr. & Dick Cheney

December 23, 2014 "ICH" - "DN" -  A human rights group in Berlin, Germany, has filed a criminal complaint against the architects of the George W. Bush administration’s torture program. The European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights has accused former Bush administration officials, including CIA Director George Tenet and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, of war crimes, and called for an immediate investigation by a German prosecutor.

Transcript

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: A human rights group in Berlin, Germany, has filed a criminal complaint against the architects of the George W. Bush administration’s torture program. The European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights has accused former Bush administration officials, including CIA Director George Tenet and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, of war crimes, and called for an immediate investigation by a German prosecutor. The move follows the release of a Senate report on CIA torture, which includes the case of a German citizen, Khalid El-Masri, who was captured by CIA agents in 2004 due to mistaken identity and tortured at a secret prison in Afghanistan. So far, no one involved in the CIA torture program has been charged with a crime—except the whistleblower John Kiriakou, who exposed it.
AMY GOODMAN: In a statement earlier this week, Wolfgang Kaleck, general secretary of the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights, said, "By investigating members of the Bush administration, Germany can help to ensure that those responsible for abduction, abuse and illegal detention do not go unpunished," unquote.
Meanwhile, President Obama is standing by his long-standing refusal to investigate or prosecute Bush administration officials for the torture program. In a statement, he called on the nation not to, quote, "refight old arguments." As Obama continues to reject a criminal probe of Bush-era torture, former Vice President Dick Cheney has said he would do it all again. Cheney spoke to NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday.

DICK CHENEY: With respect to trying to define that as torture, I come back to the proposition torture was what the al-Qaeda terrorists did to 3,000 Americans on 9/11. There is no comparison between that and what we did with respect to enhanced interrogation. ... It worked. It worked now. For 13 years we’ve avoided another mass casualty attack against the United States. We did capture bin Laden. We did capture an awful lot of the senior guys of al-Qaeda who were responsible for that attack on 9/11. I’d do it again in a minute.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Cheney’s claim that he would approve torture again highlights a key question: Are top officials above the law, and will the impunity of today lead to more abuses in the future? The question spans a wide chain of command from Cheney, President Bush and other White House officials, who kickstarted the torture program after 9/11; to the lawyers in the Justice Department, who drafted the memos providing legal cover; to the CIA officials, who implemented the abuses and misled Congress and the public; and to the military psychologists, who helped devise the techniques inflicted on prisoners at U.S. military prisons and secret black sites across the globe.

AMY GOODMAN: To talk more about this, we’re joined now by two guests. Michael Ratner is back with us, president emeritus of the Center for Constitutional Rights, chair of the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights. CCR has been working with the European Center to file criminal complaints against Bush administration officials complicit in the use of torture. He’s also the author of The Trial of Donald Rumsfeld: A Prosecution by Book.

Martin Garbus is also back with us, one of the leading attorneys in the U.S. Time magazine calls him "one of the best trial lawyers in the country."National Law Journal has named him one of the country’s top 10 litigators.

We welcome you both back to Democracy Now! Yesterday we were talking to you both about Cuba; today we’re talking about all the news that has come out. Martin Garbus, should President Bush, should George Tenet, should Donald Rumsfeld, should Dick Cheney be put on trial for torture?

MARTIN GARBUS: They should be. The bad thing about it is they all have a defense they can rely on: They have the defense of the lawyers’ opinions that were given to them—the opinions of Gonzales, Bybee and John Yoo. And unless you can pierce those decisions, you have a very tough time. It seems to me a prosecution that ends badly—and I think it would end badly in the United States—might not be one that will be brought. But what should happen is with respect to those lawyers. When Jay Bybee was elected to the court of appeals in 2002—was nominated and then voted upon by the Senate—and John Yoo presently teaches at Berkeley university. At the—

AMY GOODMAN: At University of California, Berkeley, law school.

MARTIN GARBUS: California. At the time that Yoo was appointed to Berkeley, there was a mass demonstration of students against him. At the time that Bybee was nominated for the judgeship by Bush, he was criticized, but you did not yet have all this information. What Senator Leahy has said, that if you had all this information, Jay Bybee never would have passed. Clearly, if you had all this information that you have now, John Yoo wouldn’t be appointed. What should happen is there should be complaints filed in the bar associations. They should be suspended and disbarred. Then, perhaps, if you have a prosecution, you already have established the faultiness, the horrific faultiness, of the legal opinions. So it seems to me, at least in this country, a condition precedent, as we lawyers say, before you can have a prosecution, has to be the invalidation of the legal opinions.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And—

MICHAEL RATNER: I want to just say, I’m not here to debate Marty on this. And he’s a defense lawyer. But I strongly disagree that Bush, Cheney, et al., would have a defense. This wasn’t like these memos just appeared independently from the Justice Department. These memos were facilitated by the very people—Cheney, etc.—who we believe should be indicted. This was part of a conspiracy so they could get away with torture. But that’s not the subject here now. I just want to—so, that is clear to me.

Secondly, whatever we think of those memos, they’re of uselessness in Europe. Europe doesn’t accept this, quote, "golden shield" of a legal defense. Either it’s torture or it’s not. Either you did it or you didn’t. And that’s one of the reasons, among others, why we’re going to Europe and why we went to Europe to bring these cases through the European Center.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But I wanted to ask you about that, because—as the clip we played of President Obama saying it’s no use refighting old arguments, but you are in essence refighting arguments in Europe that the United States refuses to deal with.

MICHAEL RATNER: But, of course, you know, Cheney just showed us exactly why you have to—have to prosecute torture. Because if you don’t prosecute it, the next guy down the line is going to torture again. And that’s what Cheney said: "I would do it again."

And now, the European case is really interesting. We did try this in 2004—you covered it here. We tried it in 2006—you covered it here. But now, because of the Senate report, we have a much stronger case in Germany than we ever had, particularly with regard to a German citizen, Khalid El-Masri, who was taken off the streets of Macedonia, sent to the Salt Pit, which is known as Cobalt in the Senate report.

AMY GOODMAN: Wait, explain, though.

MICHAEL RATNER: Yeah, yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: Tell us that story. It’s a remarkable story. He was on a bus?

MICHAEL RATNER: He was on a bus to take a vacation in Skopje in Macedonia, and he gets pulled off by agents of our government, gets taken off the bus, gets, you know, sodomized, essentially, with a drug, and then gets taken from there to the Salt Pit in Afghanistan, which is a CIA black site torture center, known as Cobalt in the report. He’s there for four months. Everybody knows by—at some point along, this is a mistake. There was another guy with a similar name. It wasn’t this guy. Even after they’re told that it’s a mistake, they leave him in there, and they leave him to be tortured. They finally, at the end of this, just take him out of there, and they drop him off somewhere—

AMY GOODMAN: Condoleezza Rice was involved with this, right?

MICHAEL RATNER: Condoleezza Rice, and so was this woman—

AMY GOODMAN: They held him further because they realized they had been torturing the wrong man.

MICHAEL RATNER: That’s correct. And the European Court of Human Rights actually weighed in on this case. And what they did is they held Macedonia liable for allowing that kidnapping on their streets, and fined them. And they found that what happened to him on the streets of Macedonia was torture. So—

AMY GOODMAN: Who else was involved?

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, we—I want to go to Khalid El-Masri in his own words, describing his time inside a secret CIA prison in Afghanistan.

KHALID EL-MASRI: [translated] I was the only one in this prison in Kabul who was actually treated slightly better than the other inmates. But it was known among the prisoners that other prisoners were constantly tortured with blasts of loud music, exposed to constant onslaughts of loud music. And they were—for up to five days, they were just sort of left hanging from the ceiling, completely naked in ice-cold conditions. The man from Tanzania, whom I mentioned before, had his arm broken in three places. He had injuries, trauma to the head, and his teeth had been damaged. They also locked him up in a suitcase for long periods of time, foul-smelling suitcase that made him vomit all the time. Other people experienced forms of torture whereby their heads were being pushed down and held under water.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: That was Khalid El-Masri describing his torture in a CIA black site. Michael?

MICHAEL RATNER: Well, yes, and they knew he was innocent. And there’s a woman who was just identified—who has been identified for a long time, who works for the CIA. Her name is Bikowsky, Alfreda Frances Bikowsky, who apparently was one of the people who insisted, even though there was people in the agency saying that "We’ve got the wrong guy," who insisted on having him picked up and taken there. She’s also, apparently, one of the models for the woman in Zero Dark Thirty. And Jane Mayer recently wrote an article about her; it’s, I think, called "The Queen of Torture" or something like that ["The Unidentified Queen of Torture"]—didn’t identify her by name. But she is one of the defendants in the lawsuit in Germany.

And let me just say, Germany—whatever happened before, between the NSA spying on Germany and the fact that their citizen has now been revealed to have been kept in a torture place, when it was known that he was innocent, I’m pretty sure that Germany is going to take this very seriously.

And I just spoke to a person you’ve had on here before, Scott Horton, who’s the columnist for Harper’s, as well as an expert on national security, and Scott tells me that because of these cases we have filed in Europe, that over a hundred CIA agents have been given advice that they should not leave the United States. Let me just say, what we’re going to win here in the end, I can’t say, but that already to me is a major victory.

MARTIN GARBUS: A major victory would be to prosecute the lawyers themselves—

AMY GOODMAN: Martin Garbus.

MARTIN GARBUS: —because otherwise what’s going to happen in the future is you’re going to have activities, like Cheney or whomever, you’ll have people in the CIA and the NSA relying on faulty legal opinion. So I think a strong emphasis in the United States has to be stop future lawyers from doing the same thing as was done here.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And your point is that these memos, they consciously knew that they were violating torture statutes.

MARTIN GARBUS: They consciously knew. And I think Michael is right, of course, that they were doing it under the chain of command—Cheney and the other people. But I think that’s very difficult to prove, and I think you should go after the lawyers immediately now.

AMY GOODMAN: And, of course, since that time, John Yoo is an eminent professor at University of California, Berkeley, law school, and Bybee—

MARTIN GARBUS: Jay Bybee is a respected federal judge. "Respected."

AMY GOODMAN: —was elevated to a judgeship.

Link : http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article40549.htm

Unarmed People of Color Killed by Police, 1999-2014

On Wednesday, after the announcement that NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo would not be indicted for killing Eric Garner, the NAACP's Legal Defense Fund Twitter posted a series of tweets naming 76 men and women who were killed in police custody since the 1999 death of Amadou Diallo in New York. Starting with the most recent death, what follows are more detailed accounts of many of those included in the Legal Defense Fund's tweets.

Rumain Brisbon, 34, Phoenix, Ariz.—Dec. 2, 2014

Brisbon, an unarmed black father of four, was shot to death in when a police officer apparently mistook his bottle of pills for a gun. Aftermath: Pending.

Tamir Rice, 12, Cleveland, Ohio—Nov. 22, 2014

Officer Tim Loehmann shot and killed Rice, who was holding a BB gun, seconds after spotting him at a park. Aftermath: Rice's family has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Cleveland.

Akai Gurley, 28, Brooklyn, NY—Nov. 20, 2014

Gurley was shot in a dark stairwell of an East New York housing project building by Officer Peter Liang. Gurley was unarmed. Police Commissioner William Bratton called Gurley "a total innocent." "The cop who was standing behind Officer Liang doesn't know what happened; the girlfriend doesn't know what happened," a senior police official told the New York Times. "There is a distinct possibility that Officer Liang doesn't quite understand what happened."Aftermath: District Attorney Ken Thompson announced that he is investigating.

Kajieme Powell, 25, St. Louis, Mo.—August 19, 2014

Powell was shot by police who responded to a 911 call accusing him of stealing some energy drinks and pastries. Cops claimed that he approached them holding a knife "in an overhand grip"; video footage of the incident shows that Powell did not come as close to the police as they reported and that his hands were by his side. Police shot him within 15 seconds of arriving at the scene. Aftermath: Powell's family has filed a wrongful death suit against the St. Louis police chief and arresting officers.

Ezell Ford, 25, Los Angeles, Calif.—August 12, 2014

Ford was shot by police who were conducting "an investigative stop." " A struggle ensued," read the LAPD's news release. Ford's family members say he was lying down when shot. Aftermath: The LAPD, which hasn't closed the investigation into Ford's death, put an indefinite "investigative hold" on the coroner's autopsy report to prevent witness testimony from being tainted.

Dante Parker, 36, San Bernardino County, Calif.—August 12, 2014

Police responded to a call about an attempted break-in. The suspect fled on a bicycle. Police found Parker nearby riding his bike. He was unarmed. He resisted arrest and a struggle ensued. Police tasered him and he died. Aftermath: Pending. The NAACP has called for a federal investigation.

Michael Brown, 18, Ferguson, Mo.—August 9, 2014

Shot by Officer Darren Wilson after an altercation that happened inside Wilson's car. Wilson reported that Brown "looked like a demon." Aftermath: Wilson was not indicted by a grand jury. He resigned from the Ferguson police force. "The family greatly wanted to have the killer of their unarmed son held accountable. They really would look at every legal avenue," saidBrown's family's lawyer Benjamin Crump.

John Crawford III, 22, Beavercreek, Ohio—August 5, 2014

Crawford was fatally shot while carrying a pellet gun in a Wal-Mart. The gun was unsold merchandise and out of its package. A man named Ronald Ritchie told 911 that he looked like he was pointing it at people, but a month later he admitted that Crawford was not pointing the gun at people. Aftermath: No indictment.

Tyree Woodson, 38, Baltimore, Md.—August 2, 2014

Police say Woodson's fatal gunshot wound was self-inflicted. That would mean that he smuggled his gun into a police station after police brought him there for having several open warrants. "Things don't seem quite right here," said Baltimore Councilman Carl Stokes. "This person could have a gun, a high caliber gun, that could be used against other officers and then he allegedly kills himself." Aftermath: Pending.

Eric Garner, 43, New York, N.Y.—July 17, 2014

Police alleged they saw Garner selling illegal untaxed cigarettes, but witnesses at the scene said he was stopped because he broke up a fight. After an argument, Officer Daniel Pantaleo placed Garner in a chokehold. Garner died of neck compression from the chokehold along with "the compression of his chest and prone positioning during physical restraint by police."Aftermath: The New York City medical examiner ruled Garner's death a homicide. Pantaleo was not indicted.

Victor White III, 22, Iberia Parish, La.—March 22, 2014

The coroner says he shot himself while handcuffed in the back of a police cruiser. The autopsy report claims, White's injuries "are possible to be self-inflicted even with the hands handcuffed behind the back." "Short of him being Houdini or David Copperfield, it's not possible," saidWhite's family's attorney. Aftermath: Pending. District Attorney Phil Haney of the 16th Judicial Circuit, who said he will let a federal investigation run its course before making a decision.

Yvette Smith, 47, Bastrop, Texas—February 16, 2014

Officers responding to a domestic disturbance call shot after she opened her front door to them. Initially, police claimed that Smith had a firearm, but the sheriff's office retracted this the next day. Aftermath: Deputy Daniel Willis, who shot Smith, was indicted on a murder charge. Her family is asking for $5 million in a wrongful death suit.

McKenzie Cochran, 25, Southfield, Mich.—January 28, 2014

Cochran died of "position compression asphyxia" during struggle with mall security. Cochran told them, " I can't breathe." His death ruled an accident by medical examiner. Aftermath: No indictments for the security guards.

Jordan Baker, 26, Houston, Texas—January 16, 2014

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An off-duty police officer thought Baker fit the description of robbery suspects—both they and he were wearing black hooded sweatshirts. A scuffle and foot chase ensued. Baker, who was unarmed, was fatally shot. Aftermath: Officer J. Castro, who killed Baker, was placed onadministrative leave pending an investigation. Baker's mother was said to be considering filing a lawsuit.

Andy Lopez, 13, Santa Rosa, Calif.—October 22, 2013

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Lopez was carrying a pellet gun that resembled an AK-47 assault rifle. After officers reportedly told Lopez to drop the gun, he turned toward them and they shot him. Aftermath: Noindictment.

Miriam Carey, 34, Washington, D.C.—October 3, 2013

While attempting to make a U-turn at a White House checkpoint, Carey allegedly hit a barricade and a Secret Service officer in front of the White House. After a high-speed chase, police surrounded her, weapons drawn. She was shot five times in the chase and died at the scene. She was unarmed. Her daughter was in the car with her and was unharmed.Aftermath: The U.S. Attorney's Office declined to press charges.

Jonathan Ferrell, 24, Bradfield Farms, N.C.—September 14, 2013

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Ferrell crashed his car and knocked on the door of a nearby house. The woman inside called the police. Police said that when Ferrell was apprehended, they shot him. Ten times. Aftermath: Officer Randall Kerrick has been indicted on a charge of voluntary manslaughter. It took two grand juries to get there.

Carlos Alcis, 43, New York, N.Y.—August 15, 2013

Alcis died of a heart attack after the police mistakenly raided his home in search of a cell phone thief. Aftermath: Alcis's family has filed a wrongful death suit against the city and the NYPD for $10 million.

Larry Eugene Jackson, Jr., 32, Austin, Texas—July 26, 2013

Jackson was fatally shot during a scuffle resulting from a chase that took place when detective Charles Kleinert apprehended Jackson for trying to "defraud" a bank. Aftermath: Kleinert was indicted on a manslaughter charge.

Deion Fludd, 17, New York, N.Y.—May 5, 2013

Police say that a train clipped Fludd as the chased him after dodging subway fare. According to his mother, Fludd denied this before succumbing to his injuries. Aftermath: Fludd's mothersued the officers involved, the NYPD, and the MTA.

Kimani Gray, 16, New York, N.Y.—March 9, 2013

Police said Gray pointed a revolver at them as they attempted to question him. Friends and family say Gray had never had a gun, and a witness says he never pointed one at police. The cops shot a total of 11 rounds, striking Gray several times. Aftermath: No indictments for the cops responsible for shooting Gray.

Johnnie Kamahi Warren, 43, Dotham, Ala.—December 10, 2012

A Houston County Sheriff's deputy spotted Warren struggling with three other men outside a bar. Upon approaching Warren, he used a taser at least twice. Soon after additional officers arrived and arrested him, he lost consciousness and died at the hospital soon after. Outcome:An Alabama Bureau of Investigation probe; the sheriff's deputy was placed on paid leave.

Malissa Williams, 30, and Timothy Russell, 43, Cleveland, Ohio—November 29, 2012

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Russell led 62 police cars on a chase that ended with 137 shots being fired at his car, killing him and Williams. Police believed someone in Russell's car had fired at them first. Cornered at a middle school, Cleveland Patrolman Michael Brelo jumped on top of Russell's car from behind, climbed to the hood, and fired 15 more shots. Aftermath: A judge approved a settlement between the city and the two's families—$1.5 million each. Brelo was indicted in May 2014 for voluntary manslaughter. His trial date has not been set.

Reynaldo Cuevas, 20, New York, N.Y.—September 7, 2012

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Cuevas was shot and killed by police as he was fleeing armed men attempting to rob the bodega he worked at. Aftermath: The Bronx District Attorney did not find the officer at fault and declined to move the case forward to a grand jury. His mother filed a $25 million wrongful death claim against the city last year.

Chavis Carter, 21, Jonesboro, Ark.—July 29, 2012

Police say Carter killed himself while handcuffed in the back of a police car. His mother pointed out that he was left-handed (he would have shot himself with his right hand), detained for marijuana while his concealed weapon supposedly went undetected, and not suicidal.Aftermath: The officers involved were placed on administrative leave and the FBI stepped in to "monitor and assess " the situation. His mother filed a wrongful death suit.

Shantel Davis, 23, New York, N.Y.—June 14, 2012

After reports of a fight at the BART train station, police detained Grant and some of his friends. While Grant was lying face down, resisting arrest, a police officer named Johannes Mehserle shot him. The officer claimed he meant to taser Grant. Aftermath: Mehserle was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter and not guilty of second-degree murder and voluntary manslaughter. He was sentenced to two years in prison. BART paid Grant's mother and daughter $2.8 million to settle the civil suit they filed. Grant's father lost a civil case against Mehserle.

Tarika Wilson, 26, Lima, Ohio—January 4, 2008

A SWAT team arrived at Wilson's home with the intention of arresting her companion for dealing drugs. When they opened fire, they shot and killed Wilson. Aftermath: Sgt. Joe Chavalia, who shot Wilson, was acquitted of two misdemeanors: negligent homicide and negligent assault. Wilson's family received a $2.5 million wrongful death settlement.

DeAunta Terrel Farrow, 12, West Memphis, Ark.—July 22, 2007

Farrow was out walking with his 14-year-old cousin when gunned down by a police officer, Erik Sammis. Sammis claims that only after he shot Farrow did he realize that the gun Farrow was carrying was a toy. Aftermath: Sammis wasn't indicted. He resigned from the force via a letterthat contained the sentence, "Then there are others who are not rational and breed hate and racism in this community." Sammis and Jimmy Evans, who was also on duty with him July 22, 2007, were found not liable in Farrow's family's $250 million civil suit.

Sean Bell, 23, New York, N.Y.—November 25, 2006

On the night before Bell's wedding, Bell and his friends attempted to flee the scene of escalating tension with the police. The police fired about 50 shots into Bell's car, killing him in the process:Aftermath: All three officers were acquitted on all charges. They and their commanding officer were fired/forced to resign. New York City agreed to pay Bell's family $3.25 million to settle their wrongful death suit.

Henry Glover, 31, New Orleans, La.—September 2, 2005

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Glover was shot in the chest by NOPD officer David Warren at a strip mall in the days following Hurricane Katrina. Glover, with the help of a friend, attempted to get aid, and ended up handcuffed. He died. NOPD Officer Greg McRae set fire to Glover's body in Glover's friend's car.Aftermath: David Warren was sentenced to 25 years and 9 months on a manslaughter conviction. Greg MacRae got 17 years and 3 months for obstruction of justice. About a year and a half later, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals vacated Warren's convictions and two of MacRae's, ordering new trials. Warren was acquitted in the retrial.

Ronald Madison, 40, and James Brisette, 17, New Orleans, La.—Sept. 4, 2005

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Police received a call claiming gunfire on the Danziger Bridge. Police opened fire upon arriving in a Budget Rental Truck. They hit Brisette. Madison, who was developmentally disabled, fled. Two cops chased him down. One, Robert Faulcon, shot him. The other, Sgt. Kenneth Bowen, was convicted of stomping Madison on the back before he died. Aftermath: That conviction was later overturned. Police attempted a coverup. Eventually five officers involved in the shooting were found guilty of various charges. Faulcon was sentenced to 65 years' imprisonment, Bowen and Sgt. Robert Gisevius Gisevius received 40 years, Officer Anthony Villavaso got 38 years, and Arthur "Archie" Kaufman, who was the investigator placed on the case and eventually found guilty of conspiring to conceal evidence, received 6 years. A month later, the same judge that convicted them, Kurt Engelhardt, vacated their convictions andordered a new trial as a result of the defendants' appeal and "highly unusual, extensive and truly bizarre actions" by prosecutors.

Timothy Stansbury, 19, New York, N.Y.—January 24, 2004

Officer Richard S. Neri Jr., testifed that he shot the unarmed Stansbury by accident when Stansbury pushed open the rooftop door of a building Neri was patrolling. Aftermath: Neri was not indicted. He was suspended for 30 days without pay and stripped of his gun permanently. The NYPD settled the wrongful death lawsuit of Stansbury's family for $2 million.

Alberta Spruill, 57, New York, N.Y.—May 16, 2003

Police knocked down Spruill's door, apparently acting on bad information that there were drugs and guns inside her apartment. They threw a concussion grenade into her home. She died of a heart attack. Aftermath: The city paid Spruill's family $1.6 million as a settlement for the wrongful death lawsuit they filed.

Ousmane Zongo, 43, New York, N.Y.—May 22, 2003

Zongo was shot four times (twice in the back) by officer Bryan Conroy during a police raid in a storage facility where Zongo worked. Zongo was unarmed and his business (art and musical instrument reparation) had nothing to do with what the police were investigating (CD and DVD piracy). Aftermath: Conroy was convicted of criminally negligent homicide. He received five years probation and lost his job. Zongo's family received $3 million in a wrongful death suit.

Orlando Barlow, 28, Las Vegas, Nev.—February 28, 2003

Barlow was hired to babysit seven children. After a supposed argument, his employer (the children's mother) called the police, saying that Barlow was holding her children hostage with a sawed-off shotgun. Police responded to the call. Barlow was shot while surrendering. He was unarmed. Aftermath: A coroner's inquest labeled the shooting "excusable." The FBI looked into it. "The shooting was unanimously ruled justifiable, but Hartman and two other officers were fired after they printed T-shirts with the initials 'BDRT' — 'Baby's Daddy Removal Team,'"reported the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Timothy Thomas, 19, Cincinnati, Ohio—April 7, 2001

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Nine officers pursued Thomas, who was wanted on 14 misdemeanor counts. Twelve of them were traffic violations. A chase ensued. Thomas ran into an alley and was shot by Patrolman Stephen Roach, who joined the group of nine officers during the pursuit. Roach said he believed Thomas was going for a gun, but an investigation later revealed that Thomas was attempting to pull up his pants. Aftermath: Roach was acquitted on a charge of negligent homicide. An investigation later revealed that Roach lied on his incident report and broke protocol.

Prince Jones, 25, Fairfax County, Va.—Sept. 1, 2000

An undercover narcotics agent followed the unarmed Jones, firing 16 shots at him while Jones was in his Jeep. Eight landed. Officials later confirmed that Officer Carlton Jones (no relation)mistook Prince Jones for someone else. Aftermath: The Fairfax commonwealth's attorney and the Justice Department declined to file charges against the officer, Carlton Jones. The case was not put before a grand jury. Five years after the killing, Prince Jones's parents and daughter were awarded $3.7 million in a wrongful death lawsuit.

Ronald Beasley, 36, and Earl Murray, 36, Dellwood, Mo.—June 12, 2000

Beasley and Murray, described as family and friends as small-time drug dealers, were shot and killed during an attempted drug bust in a restaurant parking lot. One cop called the killings "unintended, but not a mistake." Aftermath: The officers were cleared of wrongdoing after a yearlong investigation.

Patrick Dorismond, 26, New York, NY—March 16, 2000

An undercover cop approached Dorismond and his friend, Kevin Kaiser, when they were standing outside of a lounge. The cop asked where he could buy marijuana. A scuffle ensued and another undercover cop, Anthony Vasquez, stepped in to help his partner. Vasquez claimed Dorismond grabbed his gun and caused it to discharge into his own chest. Vasquez said the first cop was in their face, and that he attempted to pull Dorismond out of the confrontation to no avail. Aftermath: Vasquez was not indicted. New York paid the Dorismond family $2.25 million as a settlement in a wrongful death suit.

Malcolm Ferguson, 23, New York, N.Y.—March 1, 2000

Drug officers "noticed some movement" in the hallway of a public housing building and investigated. Ferguson, who was unarmed, ran up the stairs. "At some point, on the second-floor landing, there was a struggle," Chief John Scanlon said. "The [officer Officer Louis Rivera's] firearm discharged." Aftermath: Rivera was cleared of wrongdoing. Ferguson's mom, Juanita Young, was awarded $10.5 million as a result of her wrongful death suit against the NYPD and the city.

Amadou Diallo, 23, New York, N.Y.—Feb. 4, 1999

Four plainclothes officers fired a total of 41 shots at Diallo outside of his apartment in the Bronx. Nineteen hit him. He was armed with a wallet, which an officer mistook for a gun when he pulled it out of his pocket. Officers initially approached him because he supposedly matched the description of a serial rapist. Aftermath: The officers were acquitted of all charges. Diallo's mother and stepfather filed a $61 million ($20m plus $1m for each shot fired) wrongful death suit against the officers and New York city. They settled for $3 million.