blog of bile » DEA

How the US government poisoned 10k people during Prohibition

bile — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 02:24:39 +0000

http://www.slate.com/id/2245188

It was Christmas Eve 1926, the streets aglitter with snow and lights, when the man afraid of Santa Claus stumbled into the emergency room at New York City’s Bellevue Hospital. He was flushed, gasping with fear: Santa Claus, he kept telling the nurses, was just behind him, wielding a baseball bat.

Before hospital staff realized how sick he was—the alcohol-induced hallucination was just a symptom—the man died. So did another holiday partygoer. And another. As dusk fell on Christmas, the hospital staff tallied up more than 60 people made desperately ill by alcohol and eight dead from it. Within the next two days, yet another 23 people died in the city from celebrating the season.

Doctors were accustomed to alcohol poisoning by then, the routine of life in the Prohibition era. The bootlegged whiskies and so-called gins often made people sick. The liquor produced in hidden stills frequently came tainted with metals and other impurities. But this outbreak was bizarrely different. The deaths, as investigators would shortly realize, came courtesy of the U.S. government.

Frustrated that people continued to consume so much alcohol even after it was banned, federal officials had decided to try a different kind of enforcement. They ordered the poisoning of industrial alcohols manufactured in the United States, products regularly stolen by bootleggers and resold as drinkable spirits. The idea was to scare people into giving up illicit drinking. Instead, by the time Prohibition ended in 1933, the federal poisoning program, by some estimates, had killed at least 10,000 people.

Today the US government continues to kill tens of thousands less directly through the so called war on drugs. From raids to bad black market heroin those in power systematically place those people in danger who they swore an oath to protect.

Even after all charges are dropped against parents, courts order 7-year old child be adopted

laur — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 15:38:25 +0000

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/

The recording begins with the sound of a child’s voice. It belongs to a little girl and she is clearly bewildered and distressed.

At one point she begins to cry. At other times she is sobbing uncontrollably. ‘Have you seen the judge yet?’ she can be heard asking pitifully in between the tears before pleading: ‘I want to go home with [you] Mummy and Daddy.’

The recording – and dozens of others just like it – was made during a supervised meeting between the youngster and her parents after their daughter was taken away from them by social workers.

They are known as ‘contact visits’ in the soulless vernacular of the care system, and took place in a room with a table and chairs and a few toys.

One hour. Once a month. That’s the extent of the relationship now between this little seven-year-old girl and her traumatised parents.

There are some parents who do not deserve to see their children more than once a month. Irresponsible parents. Neglectful parents. Abusive parents.

According to care workers, the mother and father of this little girl were found to fall into this category after their home was raided by the RSPCA and at least 18 police officers to deal with a complaint about supposed mistreatment of dogs.

But what if social workers have got it wrong? In the light of Baby P and so many other scandals, it’s hardly impossible is it?

Certainly, the recordings stored on a computer at the family’s home on the South Coast seem to contradict the damaging claims by social services that the girl, whom we shall call Jenny – the girl’s real identity has been suppressed by the courts – did not wish to return to live with her parents.

Jenny’s father spent months taking down every word of the recordings by hand, only to be told by a judge that they had to be professionally transcribed.

By the time they were, it was too late. Moves to put Jenny up for adoption were under way.

This week, after 74 separate court hearings over two harrowing years, the family finally lost their fight to have Jenny returned to them.

The Court of Appeal in London ruled that their daughter must be given up for adoption. If and when she is, they may never see her again.

Jenny was five when she was taken away, and seven now. Before we examine the peculiarly troubling details of this case, it is worth considering the comments of the family’s MP, Charles Hendry.

He says: ‘This case has concerned me more than any other in my 13 years as a member of Parliament.’ And, he went on to describe Jenny’s mother and father as ‘devoted parents’.

Furthermore, one of the experts brought in to examine the child’s removal, a psychiatric social worker, concluded the local authority had ‘mismanaged the case’. Needless to say, his advice was ignored.

They are not lone voices: more than 200 local people, including neighbours, friends and members of the couple’s church, planned to take part in a march through their village shortly after the family’s ordeal began in April 2007.

Posters were printed, which read ‘Social Services Have Kidnapped Our Daughter. Please Help The Fight To Get Her Back Where She Belongs.’ Above the words was a picture of Jenny.

Of course, you won’t have read about the protest, because it never took place. The march was just about to begin when the police, acting on the advice of social services, stepped in.

They warned Jenny’s parents they risked being jailed, as they had broken the law by identifying their daughter on the placards.

Just another example of the terrifying lack of transparency that now surrounds the removal of children from their families.

Reforms to open up cases such as Jenny’s to public scrutiny were introduced earlier this year. But the truth is, an almost Stalinist culture of secrecy still exists in family courts.

Jenny was never physically harmed, and was ‘thriving and happy before being taken away’, the Court of Appeal was told.

One of the reasons for the decision was that Jenny’s father had been unwilling to undergo a further assessment.

Wouldn’t other parents in his position have done the same?

After all, the case had already dragged on for two years and he believed yet another ‘assessment’ would delay the tortuous process even more.

Yet, here we are today on the cusp of Jenny being spirited away from her family for ever.

No one suggests that Jenny’s parents – whom we’ll call Susan and Richard – are perfect. But over the past few weeks, our reporters have come to know the family. And one thing seems undeniable – their love for their daughter, and her love for them.

Jenny is a beautiful child with a mop of chestnut hair. She loved ballet, swimming and Susan and Richard paid for her to have private tennis lessons.

Her bedroom – with her own ensuite bathroom – in the family’s home is almost unchanged from the day she last slept there.

Her favourite pink teddy bear is still sitting under the windowsill. And a collection of her videos are on a shelf.

‘She loved Grease and pretending to be Olivia Newton-John,’ her mother told me last night as her eyes filled up with tears. ‘It’s hard to come into my daughter’s room without crying.’

Susan, in her 40s and involved in her local Conservative Association, used to be a beautician before becoming a fulltime mother – that was how important her child was to her.

Her husband Richard, 32, runs a dog breeding business from their home. They have been married for 13 years.

They were just a normal, happy family, it seems, until the RSPCA, backed up by 18 police officers, arrived at their house early one April morning in 2007, following a tip-off that dogs were being mistreated, and that there might be guns in the house.

No guns were ever found. No criminal charges were brought, nor does Richard have a criminal record.

He was later, however, convicted of docking the tails of his puppies. But the raid was to have far more catastrophic consequences.

Both Richard and Susan were arrested for failing to cooperate with officers. By the time they were released from custody later that day, Jenny was the subject of an emergency protection order.

So an operation which had begun for entirely different reasons had ended with the heartbreak of their daughter being taken away.

There were two reasons for what happened, and both have been bitterly contested by the family.

The first was the state of the house. Police said it was covered in rabbit entrails – used as food for the dogs they raised – and animal excrement.

The couple claim most of the mess was caused during the raid. They say, the doors were left open, allowing the dogs in. Normally, they insisted, their home was ‘clean and tidy’.

Only a few weeks earlier a policewoman had visited them – after a puppy had been stolen – and backed up what they said.

She also said that Jenny was ‘happy’. Their home, it should also be stressed, was always immaculate when we visited the couple.

Attention was drawn to the fact that there was a hole in a downstairs bedroom ceiling. But the family point out that a pipe had recently leaked and could not be repaired until the beams had dried out. It has now been fixed.

Nor, it was claimed by the authorities, were there any clothes for Jenny in her wardrobe. Did the police look in the wrong wardrobe – the one in her parent’s bedroom?

The wardrobe in Jenny’s own bedroom, her parents say, was full of her belongings.

‘We always put Jenny first,’ said Susan. ‘We have receipts from Monsoon [the fashion store] proving we spent hundreds of pounds on Jenny in the couple of months before she was taken from us. If anything, we spoilt her.’

The second reason, according to social services, that Jenny was not returned to her parents, was that she had apparently made it clear she didn’t want to return to the house.

But why would she? Jenny was later diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) following the raid.

In fact, it would be impossible to imagine a more traumatic situation than the ‘chaotic scenes’ which unfolded at the house that morning and which culminated in her mother and father being led away in handcuffs.

In other words, not wanting to return home didn’t necessarily mean she didn’t want to be with her parents.

Those tapes made during ‘contact meetings’ in which she tearfully begs to be returned to her ‘Mummy and Daddy’ would seem to confirm this.

‘She was hysterical when the police came in,’ says Susan. ‘It’s the damage they have done to our little girl which really concerns us. I fear she will never be the same.’

There is also another sad twist to this troubling story. Susan and Richard didn’t just lose Jenny that day.

Susan was three months pregnant with twins. She says she was in a police cell when she began to miscarry.

‘I started bleeding heavily and knew that could only mean one thing,’ she said. ‘I was taken to hospital where doctors confirmed my worst fears.’

Even so, she was taken back to the police station later, where she says she suffered another haemorrhage. ‘I rang the buzzer and they brought me sanitary towels. Later, I was allowed home.’

But another nightmare was just unfolding. Susan was charged with neglecting Jenny – on the strength, she says, of the conditions in the house.

Three months later, all the charges were dropped.

Many would also argue that this is when the social services case against the couple should also have been dropped.

But, like other families who have been through a similar experience, once they were in the ’system’ they found it impossible to get out.

It is a view supported by their MP. ‘I was very concerned about the case from the outset,’ says Mr Hendry.

‘Every time I have attempted to discuss it with the director of children’s services for the county council, I have been told they cannot discuss it because of the legal proceedings.

‘What it has brought home to me is how difficult it is for parents to get back a child once a decision has been made to take the child away.

‘It is clear to me they are devoted parents whose only goal is get their child returned. I have never seen the evidence to justify taking their daughter away from them.’

In fact, the ‘evidence’ is based on the testimony of two independent experts. Two others gave the couple positive assessments. But let’s deal with the critical reports.

One ‘expert’ suggested, after spending just one hour with Jenny, that she had been sexually abused by her father.

And the proof? He came to this conclusion, it seems, after Jenny had described choking on a lollipop which, so the expert said, could ’signify the child being forced to have oral sex with her father’.

There was indeed an incident, says her mother, in which Jenny got a lolly (a sugar-free one from the health shop, incidentally) stuck in her throat when she was playing.

‘She started coughing,’ says Susan. I thought: “Oh my God, she is choking.” I patted her on the back and she was OK.’

The second expert concluded that Susan and Richard were suffering from ‘paranoid personality disorders’.

On one occasion, the police were called when Richard began taking photographs of the social services centre where a ‘contact meeting’ with Jenny was taking place.

Why? Because the grounds of the building were littered with syringes and mounds of rubbish – not a fit place, he claimed, for them to meet their bewildered child.

‘The social workers didn’t want to challenge these experts, at all,’ says Richard. ‘I would say to them: “Where is the evidence for this allegation or that allegation?” Or “produce a witness”.

‘They felt we were being obstructive to the local authority’s care plan. But what we supposed to do? Just give up. We would never do that.’

The allegations about the sexual abuse and the paranoia were dismissed by other experts, including Dr Peter Dale, a psychiatric social worker, who concluded the local authority had ‘mismanaged the case’.

They made, he said, fixed assumptions about the parents at the outset, and had not done the necessary investigations to check whether those assumptions were correct.

Dr Dale said: ‘Jenny had suffered significant harm as a result of being removed from her parents, and was likely to suffer fears of abandonment by them for some time to come and would be particularly at risk during adolescence.

‘She needed urgent therapeutic input to help her make sense of what had happened to her.’

He continued: ‘Plans for reunification [with her parents] should be established on a very urgent basis.’

Instead, Jenny is being put up for adoption. If Susan and Richard refuse to accept the decision, they could be prevented from ever seeing their daughter again. It is an outcome which their neighbours and friends can barely contemplate.

One couple are among dozens of people who have supported the couple in their desperate fight to get their only daughter back.

The pair, who have both worked in social services, say they are ‘disgusted’ with the way the case has been handled, and yesterday insisted the parents were ‘the best mother and father a child could wish for’.

The 44-year-old woman, says: ‘I worked with children in social services for 25 years and I have never seen anything like this.

‘We have been friends with the family for about five years and the only criticism I could ever make of them is that they love their little girl too much. They spoil her rotten.

‘She has spent a lot of time in our home playing with our daughter, who is a bit older, and our daughter was always over at their home.

‘She is a bright, funny, intelligent child. She is always happy and giggling. Every time we saw her she was immaculately dressed, often showing off a new frock or jewellery.

‘The way they were raided like criminals and their child snatched from their arms is disgusting.

‘There are so many children out there who do need to be monitored by social services, as demonstrated by Baby P. This little girl is not one of them.’

Last night, Jenny’s mother, tears rolling down her cheeks, described the impact on the family.

‘I go to bed thinking about Jenny and I wake up thinking about Jenny,’ she said. ‘There’s hardly a moment in the day when we are not thinking about her. It’s torture.

‘To think that our beautiful daughter is probably going to be advertised on a social services website is unbearably painful.’

No one – particularly a newspaper – has a copyright on wisdom in tragic cases such as this. But surely – in the name of justice – there are too many questions raised by the couple’s MP, neighbours and independent experts, for anyone to be certain that it’s right for Jenny to be torn away from her biological family.

White House Czar Calls for End to ‘War on Drugs’

bile — Fri, 15 May 2009 12:24:50 +0000

http://online.wsj.com/…

The Obama administration’s new drug czar says he wants to banish the idea that the U.S. is fighting “a war on drugs,” a move that would underscore a shift favoring treatment over incarceration in trying to reduce illicit drug use.

In his first interview since being confirmed to head the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, Gil Kerlikowske said Wednesday the bellicose analogy was a barrier to dealing with the nation’s drug issues.

“Regardless of how you try to explain to people it’s a ‘war on drugs’ or a ‘war on a product,’ people see a war as a war on them,” he said. “We’re not at war with people in this country.”

The Obama administration is likely to deal with drugs as a matter of public health rather than criminal justice alone, with treatment’s role growing relative to incarceration, Mr. Kerlikowske said.

The administration also said federal authorities would no longer raid medical-marijuana dispensaries in the 13 states where voters have made medical marijuana legal. Agents had previously done so under federal law, which doesn’t provide for any exceptions to its marijuana prohibition.

James Pasco, executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police, the nation’s largest law-enforcement labor organization, said that while he holds Mr. Kerlikowske in high regard, police officers are wary.

“While I don’t necessarily disagree with Gil’s focus on treatment and demand reduction, I don’t want to see it at the expense of law enforcement. People need to understand that when they violate the law there are consequences.”

You can’t convince people it’s a ‘war on drugs’ or a ‘war on a product’ because that’s impossible and just as ridiculous as a ‘war on terror’ or ‘war on a tactic.’ They see it as a war on them because it is. Drug and products exist only because people desire them. You must go after the actor behind the drug or product. The user or seller or manufacturer. Whenever you prohibit something you will enveitably make that problem worse and cause negative side effects you didn’t account for. Whether that be drugs, guns, prostitution or fast food.
While forced treatment is likely better than forced incarceration you will still have asset forfeiture happening. You’re still forcing people to do something against their will for what was likely a consensual, non-violent, voluntary ‘crime.’
Treating it as a ‘health’ issue doesn’t make me feel any better. Health in general but specifically mental health has been a tool used by violent fascist governments throughout time to remove those who they disagreed with. Many states in the USA practiced eugenics before Hitler or anyone else. Many regimes would use vague mental ‘disorders’ to lock up political advisories in padded rooms and in most countries including the United States you can be held practically forever without the same well documented legal rights that a normally imprisoned individual has. Not that that always helps.
Medical-marijuana dispensary raids? Oh yes because that promise was so well kept. I’m totally going to just ignore all of Obama’s lies and believe his drug ‘czar’ on this one.
This has been said many times but… czar? Really? Must they be so blatantly power hungry? I’ve no doubt these guys think of themselves as little emperors. It’s sick.
Even if treatment goes up will incarceration go down? Will he ask Obama to release/pardon all or some or even one of the non-violent federally held drug ‘criminals?’ The USA has the largest prison population both in total number of prisoners and per capita. The prison system is one of the fastest growing industries. To make room for non-violent drug offenders California last I heard was planning on releasing violent prisoners out early. Seems wrong on several levels.
Oh… and what about obeying the actual laws of the land Mr. Kerlikowske? You know… the US Constitution? The 9th and 10th Amendments. Would you be so kind as to point out the section in Article 1 that gives congress the power to pass such prohibitions?
Of course James Pasco is wary of the proposed changes. As he says: “I don’t want to see it as an expense of law enforcement.” What he really means is that he doesn’t want the war on drugs to shrink because then he may not get the funding or get to use his fun SWAT equipment as much. Can’t have a reduction in the police state. Gotta keep them boys employed. Can’t make it look like they aren’t enforcing the rule of law. Even though they are breaking their oath to be peace officers and to the Constitution regularly.

Obama keeping the military industrial complex well fed

bile — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 23:59:01 +0000

http://www.cnn.com/…

The Obama administration will ask Congress for another $83.4 billion to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan through the end of September, Democratic congressional sources said Thursday.

The request is expected to pay for those conflicts for the rest of the 2009 budget year, two Democratic congressional sources said.

The money would bring the running tab for both conflicts to about $947 billion, according to figures from the Congressional Research Service.

More than three-quarters of the $864 billion appropriated so far has gone to the war in Iraq, where most of the U.S. troops involved in those conflicts have been deployed, the agency estimated.

Since taking office in January, President Obama has announced plans to shift troops out of Iraq and beef up U.S. forces in Afghanistan, where American troops have been battling al Qaeda and Taliban fighters since al Qaeda’s 2001 attacks.

The additional money is needed “to fund the new strategy in Afghanistan and fund the process in Iraq that will lead to a drawdown of all of our combat troops,” White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said.

About $75 billion of the requested funds would pay for military operations, with the rest going to diplomatic programs and development aid.

The measure is likely to be the last supplemental request submitted to Congress to pay for the wars.

Likely the last supplemental request? Is it the last just like the DEA raids in California were to stop?

That didn’t last long: DEA raids San Fran Medical Marijuana Clinic

bile — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 23:22:16 +0000

http://cbs5.com/…

One week after President Barack Obama’s top law enforcement official seemed to indicate the feds would no longer raid pot clubs, DEA agents busted a medical marijuana facility in San Francisco Wednesday night.

As agents carried large plastic containers of marijuana plants out of Emmalyn’s California Cannabis Clinic at 1597 Howard Street, a small crowd of protesters formed a gauntlet outside the door, booing the agents and chanting, “our medicine is marijuana … listen to Obama!”

DEA spokeswoman Casey McEnry told CBS 5 the documents regarding the raid are sealed, so the DEA was not able to give any details.

“Based on our investigation we believe there are not only violations of federal law, but state law as well,” said DEA Special Agent in Charge Anthony D. Williams in a written statement.

Emmalyn’s has a provisional permit from the city, according to Eileen Shields, spokesperson for the San Francisco Department of Public Health, which she said is an indication the club is in good standing with city laws.

Brendan Hallanin, the pot club’s attorney, said Emmalyn’s is in compliance with state and local laws.

“They are well-respected and have a good reputation in the medical marijuana community,” said Hallanin, who added the business has never been raided in its five year existence.

Hallanin said the DEA would not tell him why the club was being busted.

“They’re going to have a huge fight on their hands if they’re arbitrarily busting clubs that are in compliance with state and local laws,” said Hallanin.

Kris Hermes, spokesperson for Americans for Safe Access, a national advocacy group for medical marijuana issues, wants the attorney general to explain the DEA’s actions.

“We’re shocked that after the Attorney General has made repeated statements that raids on California medical cannibis dispensaries would be suspended that we are seeing a continuation of that policy,” said Hermes.

I’m not shocked. Why would anyone expect a bureaucrat to tell the truth?
What did I tell bosco? I’ll believe it (that the Feds were calling off raids) when three times the average length between raids went by. Looks like I was right.

Obama Administration Takes a Step in the Right Direction

bosco — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 14:45:15 +0000

Attorney General Eric Holder announced at a press conference on February 25th that in consistency with Obama’s campaign promises there will be no more DEA raids on state run medical marijuana dispensories. It’s nice to see the federal government backing up a little bit.

DEA rejects UMass request to grow medical marijuana

bile — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 00:17:51 +0000

http://www.boston.com/…

The US Drug Enforcement Administration has rejected the bid of a UMass Amherst researcher who wants to create the second laboratory in the nation authorized to grow marijuana for medical research.

The ruling released today came nearly two years after a federal administrative law judge recommended that Lyle Craker, a horticultural professor who specializes in medicinal plants, be allowed to grow marijuana for medical research. The DEA decision, which is a final rule not subject to public comment, called the current supply of marijuana for research “adequate and uninterrupted,” and said that a second laboratory would not be in the public interest.

DEA… your existence is not in the public interest. Please shut yourself down. Thank you.

Speaking of police state TV: Sheriff Joe Arpaio to get his own series

bile — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 21:21:11 +0000

I’m not sure how this one slipped by me…

http://www.azcentral.com/…

Sheriff Joe Arpaio, TV star? It could happen when Smile … You’re Under Arrest! premieres in December on the Fox Reality channel.

“Sheriff Joe is an absolute natural,” producer Scott Satin says. “He should have his own late-night talk show. He’s wonderful on camera because he’s not acting. He is a very sincere person.”

That sincerity will be spotlighted in the show, which was filmed last year in the Valley. The premise involves elaborate sting operations used to nab people with outstanding warrants.

“It’s Punk’d meets Cops,” says Satin, whose reality credits include Who Wants to Marry My Dad? and the Sci-Fi Channel’s popular Who Wants to Be a Superhero?, in which contestants are tested in such areas and bravery and courage.

The show targeted people who had warrants issued for their arrests after failing to show up for court dates.

“That’s what we hope people take from the show,” Satin says. “If you have a court date, don’t blow it off. That will get you in trouble.”

Of course, the real entertainment comes in watching the felons get busted. In one sequence, a felon believes he is modeling Halloween costumes for a fashion show. Of course, one of the outfits consists of a prisoner’s black-and-white stripes.

In another segment, lucky criminals think they are touring the set of a sequel to The Green Mile. The film’s name: The Lime Green Mile.

Obviously, the show doesn’t make a case for Arizona having the brightest law-breakers.

“You may have smart crooks, but we have really smart producers,” Satin cracks.

Not only are our crooks gullible, they also love the spotlight. Every person caught in a sting signed a waiver to appear on TV.

“It’s the Andy Warhol phenomenon,” Allen says. “A lot of these guys thinking being on TV is a cool thing.”

At this point, three episodes have been filmed. They will air at 5 p.m. Saturdays beginning Dec. 27. After that? Satin says the plan is to produce more shows if ratings warrant (pun intended).

With COPS, DEA, Homeland Security USA, The Academy, this and probably other police state worshiping shows on TV… makes it feel like goose stepping jackboots are just around the corner.

USMC Military Police help with California DUI checkpoint

bile — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 17:01:28 +0000

This story is a week or so old but today I ran across a fax of the press release. Between the army stationing and training for domestic issues, the National Guard getting into asset forfeiture, and the DEA taking the ‘war’ part of war on drugs a little serious… the police state conspiracy theorists look less and less fringe.

Decent video about the war on marijuana

bile — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 20:41:28 +0000