Videos of Officer Azua harassing four young African Americans with intent to falsely arrest

Human Rights abuse in itty-bitty Santa Cruz: [link]

"Selective Enforcement of Smoking Ban, Obstruction of Video Reporting--Report to the Chief!"2014-08-02 Note from Norse [https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2014/08/02/18759451.php]:
Yesterday I received a phone call from advocate John Colby reporting his account of an incident of harassment downtown at Laurel and Pacific in the early afternoon. Colby noted he'd videoed some of the incident. He forwarded me his complaint and demand for public records addressed to SCPD Police Chief Kevin Vogel. His account seems to be newsworthy and instructive though I cannot vouch for its veracity. It does seem specific and credible if backed up by video and witness accounts. It also involves Officer Azua, who has never been held to account for prior reported violence, against a woman traveler Synthia Kennedy. We'll see how Chief Vogel fields this one.
Officer Azua has been accused in the past of excessive force. Synthia Kennedy reported a frightening experience in 2010 on Free Radio Santa Cruz. Go to [http://www.radiolibre.org/brb/brb100429.mp3] [1 hour and 3 minutes into the audio file] as well as [http://radiolibre.org/brb/brb100415.mp3] [41 minutes into the audio file] to hear her account. When approached subsequently for his comments, Azua simply laughed.

Bill Azua of the Santa Cruz Police Department.



Videos of Officer Azua harassing four young African Americans with intent to falsely arrest
August 16, 2014
To whom it may concern:
This is video documentation of Santa Cruz Police Department (SCPD) Officer Bill Azua trying to intimidate, harass, discriminate, stalk and use excessive force against four young African American men to provoke them so he could falsely arrest them. Officer Azua falsely cited one young man because he "thought" he had been smoking on Pacific Avenue where smoking is banned. I was a witness...none of the young men were smoking. Officer Azua also illegally ran a check for priors for this false smoking citation, a mere municipal infraction. I have witnessed many different SCPD officers Downtown giving out smoking citations—NONE have ever ran the person for priors. I have since discovered that Officer Azua has numerous complaints for excessive force, false arrest and  false detention. Sythia Kennedy is an example of this from four years ago. Robert Norse, homeless activist and journalist, documented her case against Officer Azua from that time.
Sincerely,
[signed] Patricia Colby

** Part 1: Santa Cruz Police Racism by Officer Azua and Unidentified PO [www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYa65BTWrHU]
** Part 2: Santa Cruz Police Abuse by Officer Azua and Auders [www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vc9AwlE0kY]
** Part 3: Santa Cruz Police Racism Abuse by Officer Azua and Alders [www.youtube.com/watch?v=yryMADHx-NY]
** Part 4: Santa Cruz Police Abuse by Officer Azua [www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAdHawWKArM]
** Part 5: Santa Cruz Officer Azua Racial Based Harassment of Four Young Black Men [www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6lrML6712I]

2014-08-16 comment by Brent Adams:
I see no "abuse" in any of these videos.  It is not clear, besides the man's statement, that there was no cigarette. There is also nothing besides your comments that shows racial profiling.  SCPD is empowered to enforce the law and there is a no smoking law for that area.  If you want to use the word "abuse," then please be sure that the video meets the criteria.  This situation doesn't.  It seems to showcase activists trying to catch police in something even though they are just doing routine work.  To protect yourselves against being seen as crying "wolf", please reserve words such as "abuse" and "harassment" for videos that truly showcase this behavior. As one who has been vocal in such matters, I've come to realize the power of video.  To me, this video is more about suspicion of authoritarian abuse than actual abuse.  It does not show the activists in a good light.
[signed] brent

Reply by Pat Colby:
Reading Mr. Adams reply I can understand why civil rights issues have gotten to the state they are in Santa Cruz County, which is too bad because the cause is really about the abuses, harassment and discrimination against poor and homeless individuals—the  people that seem to fall through the safety net cracks. I would like to clear up some confusion I noticed in Mr. Adam's response.
First my brother and I are NOT "activists" we are "advocates". Advocates approach issues from a completely different angle. We protect and help people on the individual level. Some examples are going with people to doctor's appointments, interceding with social services, getting people into programs that will help them get housing and other needs. Most recently we have advocated with Santa Cruz Housing Authority to get homeless, disabled people with active vouchers extensions because it is nearly impossible to find rentals in Santa Cruz County that take Sec 8. Also I spent many hours sitting with "Scarf Lady," Kate Winzell to insure she was no longer harassed nor singled out nor cited by SC Community Service Officers and SC Police Officers for her legal vending activity on Pacific Ave.
Advocates like us work with people on a one on one basis. Activists fight for the rights of large groups of individuals and don't normally work or interact on the ground floor with single individuals; walking them through social and government agencies. Advocates like myself and my brother John, are only interested in the cause of helping—we do not seek any notoriety for ourselves. There are many issues we help on. We are happy for the people we have helped to get successes for themselves, but again it is about the advocatee not ourselves. The videos posted were done not to document abuse as much as they were taken to protect the four young mens' civil rights.
Activists like Mr. Adams has been noted for documenting abuse which is extremely different—from protecting and stopping abuse. For his hard work as an "activist" we applaud him! Mr. Adams is also not privy to all the facts before he jumped to a faulty conclusion. The individuals whom we documented with the police interaction had been harassed by this Police Officer numerous times in the past. Also resulting in complaints being put into PO Azua's file. It is obvious Mr. Adams hasn't heard the upsetting account of Synthia Kennedy's interaction, false arrest and injuries at the hands of PO Azua, other SC officers plus County Sheriffs about four years, merely for daring to buy a burrito at New Leaf Market and attempting to eat it on Pacific Ave. If an advocate had been there with a video camera I am sure things would have gone differently for this PO Azua victim!
Sincerely,
[signed] Patricia Colby, Civil Rights Advocate


"What is the SCPD's policy about 'cop-watching'?" 
2014-08-01 letter from Dr. John Colby to Kevin Vogel, Chief of Police of Santa Cruz:
Dear Chief Vogel:
I am writing to serve you notice that the Santa Cruz Police Department (SCPD) harasses "cop-watchers" protecting the civil rights of people in protected classes like people of color which has been witnessed by my sister and I -- but today we were able to video record this harassment. To the point:
** This afternoon around 1:30 PM SCPD Officer Bill Azua illegally cited an African American man -- grouped with other African Americans -- in downtown Santa Cruz for smoking while my sister and I observed that this man had not been smoking.
** Officer Azua took this man aside and ran him for priors -- also illegally -- while he was citing him for smoking. I approached Officer Azua while he was detaining this African American man with my video camera. Officer Azua not only refused to identify himself, but also demanded that I move back. I asked Azua how far I needed to move back. Azua responded that I must move so that "I [he] couldn't see me." Clearly this would prevent me from video recording the incident. I moved back five feet then asked Azua is that was far enough. Azua replied, "No." I moved back five more feet. Again I asked Azua if I was far back enough. He refused to answer. Another officer came to Azua's side and also refused to identify himself. This incident lasted for several minutes as captured on digital video. As the officers left I video recorded them. The unidentified officer pointed a video camera at me.
** The African American men walked away. Azua followed them in his car to Laurel Street fronting the Taco Bell. He was then accompanied by SCPD Officer Ahlers from the Gang and Drug Task force. Azua and Ahlers took an imposing stance watching these men. I asked Officer Ahlers to identify himself. He ignored me. I asked Officer Azua to identify himself. He refused. Azua accused me of harassing them. I asked him if asking for identification constituted harassment. He replied that me talking to police officers when they didn't want to speak with me constituted harassment.
** A Pacific Ave, Taco Bell employee walked past Azua while smoking a cigarette. Azua did nothing. After I began video recording this employee, she became angry and began speaking with Azua while she had a burning cigarette in her hand. Azua did not cite her for smoking a cigarette -- she was Caucasian. The manager of the Taco Bell demanded that I stop video recording his employees from the public sidewalk. I informed him this was legal. He implied that he would have Officer Azua take action against me if I continued to video record.
** Minutes later my sister was on the telephone with SCPD Sergeant Jones. this sergeant defended Azua's demand that I move out of sight while video recording. In response to my question about how far "cop-watchers" should be from SCPD officers while video recording, Jones replied 40-50 feet. I responded that this was too far, that it would prevent any audio recording. I asked Jones what statute or policy supported this. He said it was his "opinion".
** Officer Azua and another Police Officer in another car continued to circle around the area, following these African American men, apparently to harass them

To clarify the demands and opinions of Azua and Jones, I am making a request under the California Public Records Act (CPRA). I ask for:
* the most current documents which describe the SCPD's policies about citizens (video) recording SCPD personnel.
* If these records are available electronically, then I ask that they be made available to me electronically. I am willing to pay a fee of up to $5 for this request.
Thank you for providing me records which will shed light on what happened today.
Sincerely yours,
[signed] John E. Colby, Ph.D.

SCPD PRA RESPONSE
From: Jacqueline Drechsler <jdrechsler@cityofsantacruz.com>
Date: Wed, Aug 13, 2014 at 3:14 PM
Subject: SCPD PRA Response - Subject: What is the SCPD's policy about "cop-watching"?
To: "John Colby"
Mr. Colby,
The SCPD does not have any responsive records to your request.
Thank you, [signed] Jacqui Drechsler

Justice for Cristian Flores (of Davis). Drop all Charges!

"University continues to investigate alleged police brutality incident"
2014-08-08 by Adrian Glass-Moore from "Davis Enterprise" newspaper [http://www.davisenterprise.com/local-news/university-continues-to-investigate-alleged-police-brutality-incident/]:
University officials are continuing to investigate claims that campus police improperly handled the arrest of a Davis teen on March 3 that left him bloodied.
The investigation is being overseen by the Office of Compliance and Policy rather than internally by UC Davis police at the request of Police Chief Matthew Carmichael, university spokesman Andy Fell said.
The complaint was filed by a resident of the Domes housing community who witnessed the arrest of Cristian Flores, who turned 19 in June, and the incident has attracted the wider attention of students and the city of Davis Human Relations Commission.
Flores and a classmate were walking together on the overpass above Highway 113 from the Sacramento City College Davis Center toward the Domes when they decided to share a Swisher Sweet, a brand of tobacco cigar, Flores said in an interview.
“We were just walking and talking,” recalled Flores, a graduate of King High School in Davis.
A UCD police officer was talking to a bicyclist nearby when he told them smoking was prohibited on campus. He asked them to extinguish the cigar, which they did and apologized, Flores said. The two continued walking, until the officer caught up with them and asked them for personal information.
His classmate started cooperating but Flores said, “With all due respect, Officer, I don’t have to tell you anything,” he recalled. The officer said he smelled marijuana, so Flores showed him the Swisher Sweet pack. When the officer asked him to sit down and provide his personal information, Flores refused.
“I don’t have to tell you anything. What’s your probable cause?” Flores recalled asking.
The incident escalated once other officers, including Officer S.R. Terry, arrived on the scene and grabbed Flores’ hands, slammed him on the ground, and put a knee on his neck, he said. Flores’ head was bleeding, witness accounts and video from the incident show. He said he was given a neck brace and was taken to the hospital.
His classmate was detained but not arrested.
The incident on the doorstep of the Domes attracted the attention of residents and passers-by.
Jeffrey Mendelman, a second-year UC Davis law student and Domes resident, took video with his phone and filed the university complaint.
Mendelman was sitting down for dinner at the Domes around 7 p.m. when the arrest took place.
“I just heard some sort of abnormal sound,” he recalled in a phone interview. “I went over to see what was going on.”
At that point, Flores was already in a police car. His classmate was yelling in Arabic, which prompted Terry to say he was screaming “jihad,” said Mendelman, who also filed a hate crime complaint with Student Judicial Affairs.
Mendelman said police interrogated Flores without reading him his Miranda rights. He added that he believed there wasn’t enough “suspicion to lead to a detention and then an arrest.”
“You don’t want to be the next person walking down the street and detained for no reason and beaten down,” Mendelman said. “I think that’s where the righteous anger comes from.”
Another witness wrote a letter to the editor published in The California Aggie titled “An Incident of Hate,” which described “blood on the sidewalk from the police beating (Flores) to submission.”
After searching Flores, police found marijuana, Flores admitted. He was booked at Yolo County Jail and charged with possession of marijuana and resisting officers, both misdemeanors. But he maintained that he had been smoking a Swisher Sweet and not marijuana when police confronted him.
“I was smoking the Swisher, but then they found weed,” he said. “It’s a very suspicious scenario, and I know that. It was my bad, obviously, for having it on me.”
Mendelman said police had no right to detain Flores in the first place.
“It was still a violation of his rights in the first instance, regardless of what they turned up,” he said.
The university’s investigation does not have a timeline, Fell said. If the complaint is upheld, police will be notified and can decide whether to discipline officers. The disciplining of officers is not public record, he said.
The Human Relations Commission discussed the incident in April and May and called for a statement from Chancellor Linda Katehi, a full investigation and greater awareness.
Mendelman said it has been hard to raise awareness over summer, when most students are out of town.
“Things have sort of halted for the summer, like anything else,” he said.
Flores said he hopes his experience will prevent similar incidents in the future.
“What happened was super-unnecessary and got way out of hand,” he said.

Extrajudicial murder justified by Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association of New York

Video: "PBA Blasts Anti-Police Rhetoric After Eric Garner Death", posted 2014-08-05 by NY1 News [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xylJOK3WCOc]: Leaders of two police unions had some strong words Tuesday over what they are calling anti-police rhetoric in the wake of the death of Eric Garner last month.


"Police Union Commissar: If You Resist, You Should Expect to Die"
2014-08-09 by William Grigg [http://thefreethoughtproject.com/police-union-commissar-resist-expect-die]:
“There is an attitude on our streets today that it is acceptable to resist arrest. That attitude is a direct result of a lack of respect for law enforcement.”
“We’ve heard a lot in the last number of weeks about what police officers can’t do, and what police officers shouldn’t do,” groused Patrick Lynch, designated spokesliar for the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, New York’s largest police union [http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/pba-chief-slams-political-medical-examiner-al-sharpton-article-1.1892626]. “No one’s telling us what we are able to do, and what we should do, when we’re faced with a situation where the person being placed under arrest says, `I’m not going. I’m not being placed under arrest.’”
“What is it we should do?” continued Lynch, his voice colored by theatrical incredulity. “Walk away?”
If the would-be arrestee isn’t involved in an actual crime — that is, an act of aggression against another person — the only morally suitable answer is: Yes. The cop should shut up, go away, and refrain from molesting one of his betters. The experience might encourage him to find honest work.
“We don’t have that option,” Lynch insisted. “Nor would the public that called and complained about these crimes want us to. If they called, it’s important to them.”

In this fashion Lynch attempted to shift the blame for the killing of Eric Garner on merchants in the Staten Island neighborhood where the harmless man was killed through an act of criminal homicide by NYPD officers enforcing a demented “zero tolerance” policy regarding the sale of untaxed cigarettes. Lynch, who has spent his entire adult life as a member of the coercive caste, tried to depict Garner — a micro-entrepreneur — as a menace to the public, and a threat to commerce. Lynch appears to believe that the spectacle of police killing a harmless and unarmed man is less damaging to the local economy than allowing that man to sell loose cigarettes to willing customers.
Lynch resurrected the unproven claim that plainclothes officers had seen Garner commit an act of unsanctioned petty commerce, and that he resisted their efforts to abduct him on behalf of the state’s tax-consuming class. He carefully avoided mention of the fact that Garner, according to eyewitnesses, had broken up a fight while the officers, ever vigilant for economic “crimes,” refused to intervene.
“There is an attitude on our streets today that it is acceptable to resist arrest,” lamented Lynch. “That attitude is a direct result of a lack of respect for law enforcement.”
While it is the moral duty of every decent person to cultivate disrespect for law enforcement, that attitude is not to blame (if that’s the appropriate word) for the growing resistance to officially sanctioned abduction. That inclination is a direct reaction to the impudence, arrogance, and aggressiveness of police officers, their palpable contempt for the public they supposedly serve, their sense of tribal solidarity with officers who commit crimes against innocent people, and the institutional immunity they enjoy.
“The charge of resisting arrest is a very serious and dangerous one,” insisted Lynch. “The charge exists to encourage those being arrested to comply with the lawful orders of police officers so that those officers do not have to use necessary force to make that arrest.”
In other words: If you submit with proper docility to the commands issued by the slave patrol, they won’t have to beat or kill you.
Like most exponents of that view, Lynch assumes that any gust of verbal halitosis that escapes the wet hole at the bottom of a police officer’s face is a “lawful order.” For this reason he insists that resisting arrest “is a serious crime, and must be treated that way by all.”
In fact, resisting unlawful arrest — while considered an actual crime, and prosecuted as such — is an ancient, venerable, and indispensable right of free people. Under the still-valid Supreme Court precedent John Black Elk v. U.S. (1900), a citizen has a legally recognized right to use lethal force to prevent the consummation of an unlawful arrest.
Perhaps, somewhere in the reptilian recesses of what passes for Lynch’s mind, there is an awareness of that fact, and a rapidly coalescing fear of the prospect that the public will come to understand it, as well. This may be why he admonished PBA members to use “all the resources of the NYPD” when they are dealing with a member of the productive class who isn’t willing to endure the indignity and injury of a state-licensed abduction. In other words: Use any means necessary — including lethal force — to insure that resistance is futile.

Directorate of Terrorist Identities (DTI)

WATCH COMMANDER: BARACK OBAMA’S SECRET TERRORIST-TRACKING SYSTEM, BY THE NUMBERS (2014-08-05) [https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2014/08/05/watch-commander] (archive.org) (archive.today):
(Image is of document showing the progress of TIDE. Click on it or download for better view)

[begin extracts]
Of the 680,000 people caught up in the government’s Terrorist Screening Database—a watchlist of “known or suspected terrorists” that is shared with local law enforcement agencies, private contractors, and foreign governments—more than 40 percent are described by the government as having “no recognized terrorist group affiliation.” That category—280,000 people—dwarfs the number of watchlisted people suspected of ties to al Qaeda, Hamas, and Hezbollah combined.
• The government adds names to its databases, or adds information on existing subjects, at a rate of 900 records each day.
• The CIA uses a previously unknown program, code-named Hydra, to secretly access databases maintained by foreign countries and extract  data to add to the watchlists.
When U.S. officials refer to “the watchlist,” they typically mean the TSDB, an unclassified pool of information shared across the intelligence community and the military, as well as local law enforcement, foreign governments, and private contractors.
Most people placed on the government’s watchlist begin in a larger, classified system known as the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment (TIDE). The TIDE database actually allows for targeting people based on far less evidence than the already lax standards used for placing people on the watchlist. A more expansive—and invasive—database, TIDE’s information is shared across the U.S. intelligence community, as well as with commando units from the Special Operations Command and with domestic agencies such as the New York City Police Department.
In the summer of 2013, officials celebrated what one classified document prepared by the National Counterterrorism Center refers to as “a milestone”—boosting the number of people in the TIDE database to a total of one million, up from half a million four years earlier.
The document credits that historic achievement to the Directorate of Terrorist Identities (DTI), a secretive and virtually unknown U.S. counterterrorism unit responsible for maintaining TIDE. “This number is a testament to DTI’s hard work and dedication over the past 2.5 years,” the document declares.
DTI’s efforts in Boston and Chicago are part of a broader push to obtain biometric information on the more than one million people targeted in its secret database. This includes hundreds of thousands of people who are not watchlisted. In 2013, the directorate’s Biometric Analysis Branch (BAB) launched an initiative to obtain biometric data from driver’s license records across the country. At least 15 states and the District of Columbia are working with the directorate to facilitate access to facial images from driver’s licenses. In fiscal year 2013, 2,400 such images were provided for inclusion in the secret TIDE database.
According to the documents, BAB offers its “unique skill of facial identification support” to a “broad customer base.” Last year its analysts produced more than 290 reports for other government entities, including the CIA, the New York City Police Department, and the military’s elite Special Operations Command.
The DTI also goes far beyond accessing information from state driver’s licenses. In managing the main terrorism database, the directorate coordinates with the CIA and the National Media Exploitation Center, a Pentagon wing responsible for analyzing and disseminating “paper documents, electronic media, videotapes, audiotapes, and electronic equipment” seized abroad in military or intelligence operations.
By sharing information with the military, the National Counterterrorism Center asserts, the DTI is able to “obtain additional data fusion points by accessing and exploiting NMEC data holdings.” In return, the directorate “provides NMEC with a classified biometric search capability against TIDE through automated and manual facial identification support.”
The DTI also harvests information from CIA sources, including a secret database called CINEMA— short for CIA Information Needs Management—and a secret CIA program called “Hydra,” which utilizes “clandestinely acquired foreign government information” to enhance the quality of “select populations” in TIDE.
In 2013, DTI and the CIA ran a “proof of concept” for Hydra, using Pakistan as a guinea pig. The DTI provided the CIA with a list of 555 Pakistanis in the TIDE database. After inputting the names into Hydra, the CIA “vetted these names against Pakistani Passports” and provided biographic and biometric identifiers to the DTI.
[end extracts]


"Classified Documents Show US Government's Flawed "Secret Terrorist-Tracking System";
Documents obtained by The Intercept show nearly half of government's terrorist suspects have no terrorist affiliation"
2014-08-05 by Nadia Prupis for "CommonDreams.org" [http://commondreams.org/news/2014/08/05/classified-documents-show-us-governments-flawed-secret-terrorist-tracking-system]:
(Image: The Intercept)

Nearly half of the U.S. government's terrorist suspects have no connection to any known terrorist groups, The Intercept reported on Tuesday [https://firstlook.org/theintercept/article/2014/08/05/watch-commander/].
Publishing two classified, unredacted documents related to the White House's "secret terrorist-tracking system," The Intercept journalists, Jeremy Scahill and Ryan Devereaux, report that of the 680,000 people listed on the government's widely-shared watchlist, more than 40 percent are defined as having "no recognized terrorist group affiliation." The cumulative amount of people who are in the database for no reason adds up to 280,000 — more than the total number of al-Qaeda, Hamas, and Hezbollah suspects combined.
The U.S. government adds new names or additional information on existing names to the Terrorist Screening Database (TSDB) at a rate of 900 records each day, using biometric data like fingerprints, iris scans, and facial recognition in addition to requests for data from various agencies, while the CIA uses its secretive Hydra program to collect additional information on foreign suspects living overseas.
The TSDB is shared among the intelligence community, governments, and law enforcement agencies at the local and international level, as well as with private contractors. The documents are released as the no-fly list hits an all-time high of 47,000, with President Barack Obama adding more names than George W. Bush, including Bolivian President Evo Morales and the head of Lebanon’s parliament.
In 2013, the Obama administration “quietly approved a substantial expansion” of the watchlist system, according to documents leaked to The Intercept earlier this year [https://firstlook.org/theintercept/article/2014/07/23/blacklisted/] by a "source within the intelligence community." The guideline for adding names to the list "requires neither ‘concrete facts’ nor ‘irrefutable evidence’ to designate an American or foreigner as a terrorist,” the documents stated. It was developed in secret meetings by representatives of the U.S. intelligence, military, and law enforcement agencies, including the Pentagon, CIA, NSA, and FBI.
Many of the people on the list are individuals who live or have recently applied for citizenship in the U.S., while the baseless adding of names has been known by government watchdogs for years. On Monday, the ACLU filed a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security and other national offices for illegally denying citizenship to Muslim immigrants, using a secret "national security concern" classification to deny or delay their applications for lawful residency and adding them to the watchlist without their knowledge instead.
"In 2013 alone, the watchlisting community nominated 468,749 individuals to the TSDB," the ACLU complaint states. "In 2009, the Government Accountability Office found that 35 percent of the nominations to the TSDB were outdated, and that tens of thousands of names had been placed on the list without an adequate factual basis."
In a statement released by the National Counterrorism Center, which prepared the TSDB documents, the center called the watchlisting system a "critical layer in our counterrorism defenses" and claimed it was superior to the pre-9/11 tracking process, The Intercept reported.
Despite the troubling revelations of these methods, the TSDB is only one component of a larger database called the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment (TIDE), which targets even more people based on even less information than the TSDB, The Intercept said. TIDE shares information with the U.S. intelligence community, units from the Special Operations Command, and domestic law enforcement agencies such as the New York City Police Department and other local departments.
As of 2013, there are more than one million names in the TIDE database. More than 240 "nominations" are processed daily.
In the documents, the government justifies the TIDE and TSDB programs as "necessary for our nation’s counterterrorism mission."
Additional details revealed by The Intercept include:
* 16,000 people, including 1,200 Americans, have been classified as “selectees” who are targeted for enhanced screenings at airports and border crossings.
* There are 611,000 men on the main terrorist watchlist and 39,000 women.
* The top five U.S. cities represented on the main watchlist for “known or suspected terrorists” are New York; Dearborn, Mich.; Houston; San Diego; and Chicago. At 96,000 residents, Dearborn is much smaller than the other cities in the top five, suggesting that its significant Muslim population—40 percent of its population is of Arab descent, according to the U.S. Census Bureau—has been disproportionately targeted for watchlisting.
* The top “nominating agencies” responsible for placing people on the government’s watchlists are: the Central Intelligence Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Hina Shamsi, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Security Project, told The Intercept “[the] fact that this information can be shared with agencies from the CIA to the NYPD, which are not known for protecting civil liberties, brings us closer to an invasive and rights-violating government surveillance society at home and abroad.”
The CIA and the White House declined to comment on the article. However, Scahill noted this via Twitter just after The Intercept story went live:
jeremy scahill @jeremyscahill, 9:55 AM - 5 Aug 2014
US government, pissed we were publishing our story, tried to undermine us by leaking it to other news organization right before we published

Man tortured in public by Antioch Police Dept.

video posted 2014-08-05 by Amber R. to [https://www.facebook.com/EastCountyToday]:

J. Jones: I was there and witnessed the whole thing. This is police brutality at it's finest. Must I remind you when all this happened the guy was already handcuffed on the ground and even after being handcuffed they still beat him, tazed him and let the k9 bite him in the face twice. They literally beat the guy unconscious and then threatened my 7 month pregnant girlfriend. Now that you know what I know, go ahead and watch it again...

California National Guard and suppression of dissent in eastern Europe

"California and Ukraine National Guard gear up for military collaboration in 2015"2014-08-02 from [rt.com/usa/177520-california-ukraine-obama-military/]:
In the latest step by Washington to increase the pressure on Russia’s border with Ukraine, the Obama administration has informed Congress that the US will train and arm the Ukrainian National Guard next year, the Pentagon said.
"The Defense Department and State Department have notified Congress of our intent to use $19 million in global security contingency fund authority to train and equip four companies and one tactical headquarters of the Ukrainian National Guard as part of their efforts to build their capacity for internal defense," Reuters quoted Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral John Kirby as saying Friday.
The joint military training would take place at a facility inside Ukraine that is capable of hosting multilateral exercises, Kirby said. The advisors would be provided by US Army Europe and by the California National Guard, he added.
Also Friday, the United States pledged about $8 million in new aid to bolster the Ukrainian Border Guard Service.
The plan requires Congressional approval, but judging by the level of anti-Russian rhetoric coming from US legislators, this is expected to be forthcoming.
The California National Guard’s military partnership with the Ukraine military has existed since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
California partnered with Ukraine in 1993 to assist the country develop its military capacity, with the two sides participating in numerous military exercises over the years, including Operation Peace Shield and Operation Sea Breeze, which has particularly irked Moscow since the exercise is occasionally held in Crimea, the home of Russia’s Black Sea fleet.
The California-Ukraine partnership is expected to transition to Operation Saber Guardian – a multinational exercise involving 12 nations, including Ukraine.
It may come as a surprise to many American taxpayers that the US National Guard has nearly two dozen state partnerships with foreign countries, most of which were once part of the Soviet Union.
According to the Embassy of the United States in Ukraine, “the California–Ukraine partnership directly supports both the goals of the US Ambassador to Ukraine and Commander, US European Command.” However, the embassy provides no further details as to exactly what those specific “goals” may be.
(Image from eucom.mil)


Bad timing for California National Guardsmen?
Although the Pentagon spokesperson failed to mention Washington’s worsening diplomatic relations with Russia over the deteriorating situation in Ukraine, the announcement comes on the heels of a string of anti-Russian actions, which include a series of sanctions that target Russian businesses and banks.
The marked deterioration in Russia-US relations began late last year after former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich signaled his preference for forging economic ties with Russia - which was prepared to provide a loan bailout to Kiev, something the IMF had been hoping to do - as opposed to the so-called EU association agreement.
This decision, which proved to be politically fateful for Yanukovich, triggered a harsh response from Western governments and politicians, some of whom, including Republican presidential candidate John McCain, appeared in the Ukrainian capital of Kiev to agitate Ukrainians against Russia.
The level of Western meddling in Ukrainian politics became startlingly clear in January when assistant US Secretary of State Viktoria Nuland was recorded in telephone conversation with US Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt, where the two officials are heard discussing their preferences as to whom should take over power in the country.
The icing on the cake came when Nuland was heard to bluntly declare, “F**k the EU” with regards to the European bloc’s opinion in the matter.
The latest setback in Russia-US relations came with the July 17 downing of a Malaysian airliner over eastern Ukraine. Western countries, following in the footsteps of the United States, have been quick to cast blame on Russia for the incident, saying it has supplied the rebels with missiles.
Moscow has emphatically rejected the accusations, while at the same time presenting Kiev with a series of questions concerning the crash, including about why Ukrainian air traffic controllers allowed Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 “to deviate from the regular route to the north, toward ‘the anti-terrorist operation zone.’”

Disruption of human-rights gathering at Port of Oakland

Transnational security agencies: Israel [link]
Also see: "Facebook selectively censors a Peace & Justice event in Oakland, CA, posted at a Facebook page, bans a human-rights organizer for a day" (2014-08-18) [link]
The following message, produced in its entirety, shows how a gathering against war and for human rights is disrupted by rumor mongering and by "disaffected" participants. Notice how the disruption could also be used to disrupt an upcoming labor union campaign...

"NOT CANCELLED: Saturday 5am Picket of Israeli Ships at Port of Oakland STILL MOVING FORWARD!"
2014-08-01 from an organizer:
There's a lot of confusion about Saturday's picket of two Israeli ships at the Port of Oakland. The action has NOT been cancelled! Many of us still plan to meet at the West Oakland BART station at 5am, to go to the port and blockade the gates to Berth 57.
Some people decided to pull out of the action and declared it 'cancelled', based on a whole lot of misinformation, including that the ILWU (the longshore union), and the local Arab communities had not been contacted, neither of which is true.
Many of us feel it is irresponsible to cancel an action after thousands of flyers have been distributed, and alerts have been blasted by email and social media, and extensive efforts and resources have already gone into mobilizing for it. The situation that prompted the call for this action has not changed: Gaza remains under attack by the Israeli government, and Israeli ships are expected in the Port of Oakland on Saturday.
The people who have pulled out of the action say they plan to do this action on August 16 instead, after more 'outreach', even though we have recently seen some of the largest protests in solidarity with the people of Gaza most of us have ever seen, and the momentum for this action had been building massively and organically over just a few short days.
By August 16 many more people will have died, and what will be left of Gaza? The time to act is NOW!
And by August 16 the ILWU contract negotiations may also have escalated into their own battle, in which case it would be the worst possible time for the community to put up a picket line for Gaza. Right now longshore workers are working without a contract, potentially giving individual workers more autonomy to decide whether they will honor a community picket line. We still need to mobilize a large crowd in case they do defer to an arbitrator to rule whether our picket line invokes the health and safety clause in their expired contract (as they did in L.A. during the truckers strike recently).
While the concern from those who have declared the action 'cancelled' and 'postponed' is said to be about the Arab and longshore communities, the actual current realities of either community don't seem to be fully considered - or perhaps understood, and the political turf war of some local groups demanding they be in charge is taking selfish precedent.
There also appears to be some confusion about the expected role of the union in this action, and people are conflating the 1984 boycott of South African cargo - an action by longshore workers themselves (see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzPSaua4ovo), with the 2010 blockade of an Israeli ship - an action by the community, requesting that longshore workers honor our picket line (see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZch1ydvXvc). While it would certainly be ideal for the ILWU to refuse to handle Israeli ships, it is not a realistic expectation under the current circumstances. It is up to us to stop these ships ourselves!
Please do not let the 'decisions' of a few who deem themselves 'leaders' derail this important event! Join us on Saturday morning in taking direct action against Israel's murderous assault on the people of Gaza!
Saturday, August 2, 2014
5AM - Gather at West Oakland BART
March and/or carpool to the port at 5:10AM
(BART will not be running yet - please offer rides if you're able - there is parking at BART, but not at the port)
Blockade Berth 57 at the Port of Oakland
(map of the port: http://www.portofoakland.com/pdf/maritime/mari_map.pdf)