LOWER PRESCRIPTION DRUG PRICES? ..... LOTS A LUCK THERE JOE

Biden accuses pharmaceutical companies of inflating prescription drug prices as he urges Senate to pass his Build Back Better plan and reduce costs for patients

 

By Rob Crilly 

Daily Mail

December 6, 2021

President Biden said his Build Back Better plan would reduce drug prices as he called again for the Senate to pass his massive spending bill in the face of centrist opposition

 

President Joe Biden on Monday accused pharmaceutical companies of inflating prescription drug costs as he touted the Build Back Better Act's provisions to reduce  prices and called on the Senate to pass the legislation. 

If passed, he said it would impose penalties on drug companies that raise prices faster than inflation and cap insulin prices at $35 a month. 

'One study found that Americans paid 10 times as much as other countries for insulin,' said Biden during a speech in the White House East Room.

'These price increases are about companies looking to maximize profits and nobody standing up for the patients.'

The second plank of Biden's domestic agenda is currently stalled, awaiting passage through the Senate, where two hold-out Democrats have managed to strip out hundreds of billions of dollars in spending. 

That still leaves about $1.85 trillion in proposals, directed largely at green energy and social spending.

His comments were part of an effort to shift public debate to the sort of pocketbook issues that affect voters rather than the big, headline numbers.  

After he delivered his speech, Biden was asked whether it would pass by the Democrats' original target of Christmas. 

 

Iesha Meza, who described how she had been forced to ration her insulin with almost lethal consequences, sending her into a coma

 

'As early as we can get it,' he replied. 'I'm willing to get it done no matter how long it takes.'

Lowering drug prices is one of the most popular parts of the proposals and a recent Kaiser Family Foundation poll found 83 percent of respondents backed government efforts to reduce costs to patients.

Biden used that to make a fresh plea for his plans to be pushed through. 

'To really solve this problem, we need the Senate to follow the House of Representatives' lead and pass my Build Back Better bill,' he said.

Before his speech, Biden met patients with diabetes who told him of their struggles to pay for insulin.

They included Iesha Meza, who described how she had been forced to ration her drugs with almost lethal consequences.

'I slipped into a diabetic coma, and I could have died,' she said before introducing the president.

'This was a terrifying incident. I was ashamed that I couldn't afford my life saving medication.'

 

Biden met diabetes patients at the White House before delivering remarks in the East Room

 

Biden outlined how his legislation would help.

He said, if passed, it would limit the cost of insulin to $35 per month for Medicare patients and anyone with private insurance. 

'I've long said health care should be a right not a privilege in this country,' he said. 

'And the women I've met with today, the millions like them, are the reason why. 

'People for whom the cost of one drug is the difference between hope and fear, life and death, dignity and dependence.'

But Drugmakers oppose the move and say the proposal would damage their ability to develop new medicines.

Stephen J. Ubl, president of The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, said: 'A damaging bill jammed through a partisan process will not provide patients struggling to afford their medicines meaningful relief. 

'The bill inserts the heavy hand of government into America’s medicine cabinet, and we know when government bureaucrats set the price of medicine, patients ultimately have less access to treatments and cures.'

KAMALA IS MORE LIKE A KOMODO DRAGON THAN A BULLY

Kamala Harris a 'bully', says ex staffer as more quit over her 'soul destroying' ways 

 

By Pritha Paul  

 

meaww

December 6, 2021

 

 

Vice President Kamala Harris delivers remarks during the 10th anniversary celebration of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial 

 

In the latest damaging expose, Vice President Kamala Harris has been branded a "bully" who is "not willing to do the prep and the work" but always ready to inflict "constant-soul destroying criticism" on her office staff. 

Eighteen people connected to the VP spoke to the Washington Post, amid confirmed departures of two high-level staffers, claiming that Harris failed to read briefings they'd prepared but ended up turning on them if she was branded unprepared by the media. "It's clear that you're not working with somebody who is willing to do the prep and the work," a former colleague told the Washington Post. "With Kamala you have to put up with a constant amount of soul-destroying criticism and also her own lack of confidence. So you're constantly sort of propping up a bully and it's not really clear why." 

 

 

Kamala Harris is more like a Komodo Dragon than a bully

 

VP was 'repeating the same old destructive patterns'

These claims from the VP's staff came as two more members of her team are said to be heading for the door too. Gil Duran, who worked with Harris in 2013 for five months before quitting, said the vice president was "repeating the same old destructive patterns."

Writing in his San Francisco Examiner column, he said: "One of the things we’ve said in our little text groups among each other is what is the common denominator through all this and it’s her." Speaking to the Post, he added: "Who are the next talented people you’re going to bring in and burn through and then have (them) pretend they’re retiring for positive reasons."

'Key members of Harris' orbit' are 'eyeing the exits'

Less than a year into her vice presidency, even more "key members of Harris' orbit" are "eyeing the exits," people familiar with the conversations told Politico. Among the four staffers who are leaving is one of the vice president's closest aides Symone Sanders and communications director Ashley Etienne. Sanders is the senior adviser and chief spokesperson of VP's team. White House officials have maintained that both these departures were long-planned and did not prove that VP's office was dealing with internal chaos. 

Peter Velz, director of press operations, and Vince Evans, deputy director of the Office of Public Engagement and Intergovernmental Affairs, are also reportedly leaving, as they have confessed as much to others in the vice president's office, administration officials told the Washington Post. In the future, they are expected to remain in the administration or take jobs in close coordination with the White House.

According to Axios, Harris' staff are leaving because they're burned out. They are aware of the fact that there are better opportunities elsewhere and they don't want to be permanently branded a "Harris person." "One of the things we've said in our little text groups among each other is what is the common denominator through all this and it's her," Duran told the Post.

Harris' poll ratings have tanked

In the face of a rocky first year as vice president, riddled with project failures like handling the southern border crisis and the reported tension between her and the Bidens, Harris' poll ratings have tanked. However, Harris has hit back at claims she is being misused as vice president and dismissed her low approval ratings which plummeted to 28% in a USA TODAY/Suffolk University poll of registered voters earlier this month. 

"Polls, they go up, they go down," Harris said in an interview last month. "But I think what is most important is that we remain consistent with what we need to do to deal with the issues that we're presented with at this moment."

HEY ERICK RELAX, THIS IS YOUR LAST RIDE AND YOU'RE ALL STIFF

Viral video shows friends taking DEAD friend from grave for one final motorbike ride

 

By Tuhin Chakraborty  

 

meaww

December 5, 2021

 

 The friends, who claim they got permission from Erick Cedeno’s parents, took the body out of the coffin for one last bike ride

 

Friends took their deceased friend from his grave for one final, frightening motorbike ride. Erick Cedeno's friends claim to have gotten his parents' consent to exhume the 21-year-old's body and take him on "one more" motorcycle journey before saying their goodbyes "as they should." Erick Cedeno's friends claimed that his parents had granted them permission to take him out of his casket and execute the bizarre ritual during his Ecuadorian burial.

In the video, seven men encircle a motorbike as the lifeless body is placed in the passenger seat, according to reports by Dailymail. The video shared by Dailymail reveals clearly how the body drops over the back of the driver. His friends can be heard applauding and swinging their arms in joy.

Erick Cedeno, who was shot dead last weekend on the way to a funeral, was gently placed on the back of the motorbike driver before the vehicle took off

Friends could be seen cheering and triumphantly raising their hands in the air as they positioned Cedeno on the motorbike

Police called the act “an aberrant and unhealthy activity” — but no reported investigations have taken place due to there not being any complaints about the questionable stunt

 

Another man was seen tightly gripping the corpse in place before the motorbike rode off. The guys stated they wanted to pay honour to their friend and say their goodbyes "as they should" with this bike voyage. They even sprayed alcoholic beverages over the coffin. The body was hanging out with its arms and legs unrestrained, as the crowd cheered. Another friend or family of the dead sat with him inside his coffin, grieving his passing.

The incident occurred in Portoviejo's El Florón neighbourhood, an overcrowded residential area with 36 thousand underprivileged residents. The young people took the body out of the casket, which was clad in black slacks and a white shirt, between shoves. Others also seemed to mistreat the deceased's body is various way. Following that, they placed it onto the motorcycle in order to take it along the street.

Last Saturday, the 21-year-old had been shot and killed while on his way to a loved one's funeral. "This is the first time this has happened in the city," police said, adding that the activity was "strange and harmful." None of the persons who removed the body from the grave have been captured by authorities. There has been no investigation into the occurrence since funerals are considered private affairs. No complaints have been made since the weird bike ride, which occurred last weekend on November 29 in Ecuador's Portoviejo area.

In various parts of the globe, digging up the dead is a typical practice that is a form of remembrance or care for the deceased by relatives and friends. Families of Toraja, in the highlands of South Sulawesi, exhume the remains of their departed relatives and friends once a year to reconcile with them at the Ma'nene festival. The remains of newborns and children are reportedly also dug up to memorialise the three-day festival. Families uncover the coffins and let the bodies dry before bathing, grooming, and adorning the mummies in new exquisite clothing and taking them on a tour through the hamlet.

LOCK UP THE CRZIES!

Man with ‘wooden daggers’ threatens woman on NYC subway

 

By Kenneth Garger

 

New York Post

December 6, 2021

 

 

A thug who allegedly threatened to kill a woman on the New York subway with two wooden spikes after making ‘anti-white statements’ is being hunted by police

 

A man wielding two large wooden shivs allegedly threatened to kill a woman on a Manhattan subway train last week, police said Sunday.

The suspect spewed derogatory comments at the 46-year-old victim and made the threats aboard a 4 train near the Lexington Avenue and 59th Street station last Monday at about 7:20 a.m., according to the NYPD.

The man was holding one of the makeshift knives and a second weapon was sticking out of his pocket, according to a photo snapped by the victim.

No injuries were reported during the confrontation and the suspect remained on the loose as of early Monday.

The NYPD’s Hate Crime Task Force is investigating.

A PARTING GIFT FROM RED BILL

by Bob Walsh

Various broadcast news outlets announced today that Bill deBlasio, outgoing mayor of the open sewer sometimes known as New York City, is ordering a vaccination program for all private workers beginning on December 27.  This will put a huge crimp in New Year's Even dinning and entertainment venues.  

DeBlasio goes out of office on January 1.   He's just that kind of guy.

OK, THIS IS A NEW ONE ON ME

Woman Killed In Attack By Sheep

by Bob Walsh

Kim Taylor, 73, was a long time volunteer at the Cultivate Care Farm at Bolton, NH.  She was alone in a sheep pen when a sheep attacked and repeatedly rammed into her.  She was taken to a hospital where she was pronounced dead.

The farm is a non-profit wellness and therapy operation with a lot of smaller animals, including alpacas, sheep, goats and rabbits.  Goat Yoga is very popular.

I wonder if there will be mutton stew on the menu some time soon?

I LEFT MY CHRISTMAS GIFTS IN SAN FRANCISCO ..... ACTUALY I DIDN'T LEAVE THEM, I GOT MUGGED AT THE AIRPORT WHILE I WAS WAITING TO DEPART

How looting turned the most upscale part of San Francisco into a ghost town 

 

By Michael Shellenberger

 

New York Post

December 4, 2021

 

 

These viral photos of boarded-up boutiques in San Francisco's upscale Union Square district this week are a bleak encapsulation of the city's approach to crime

 

Usually at this time of year, San Francisco’s luxury stores are decked with holiday garlands. Instead, they’re boarded up after widespread “flash mob” looting turned Union Square — the city’s most fashionable shopping district — into an area resembling a blighted neighborhood in Detroit. 

“It’s a ghost town,” said Michelle Tandler, a San Francisco native and high-tech entrepreneur, whose photos of the stores barricaded in plywood went viral on social media this week. “Every store has a security guard. People are going to lose their jobs. And these things have a ripple effect.”

Two weeks ago, San Francisco was the first of several progressive cities hit by smash-and-grab mobs of thieves, sometimes as many as 80 in a group. Video from the San Francisco looting of Louis Vuitton shows criminals walking casually out of the store, goods in hand. Other cities hit include Los Angeles, Chicago and Minneapolis. 

“This is traumatizing for our associates and is unacceptable,” said Best Buy CEO Corie Barry four days before yet another outlet was ransacked on Black Friday in a Minnesota mall. “We are doing everything we can to try to create as safe as possible environment.”

There may be several factors behind the looting. Part of the problem is a lack of police. San Francisco and other cities are short of cops, making robberies easier to get away with. San Francisco is short 400 officers, Los Angeles 300, with Minneapolis down by 200.

Total police officers in the United States declined by 20,000 between 2008 and 2018, due to a tighter labor market, rising technological complexity within the profession, and the high psychological toll of policing. Anti-police protests following the death of George Floyd in May 2020 have led to further attrition.

Progressive prosecutors are also letting more criminals free, sending the message that theft is an understandable response to poverty. In early 2020, San Francisco’s progressive District Attorney, Chesa Boudin, told the co-founder of Black Lives Matter before an audience at the Commonwealth Club that wealth inequality caused crime, and declared he would reduce prosecution of theft.

“We have some of the richest people in the history of the world in this city. Fortunes never imaginable 10 or 20 or 50 years ago. . . . When we have those extremes in close proximity, there’s going to be some level of property crime. That’s a reality.”

DA Boudin has charged just 46 percent of theft arrests, a 16 point decline since he took office in 2020, and charged just 35 percent of petty theft arrests, a 23 point decline from two years ago. 

 

San Francisco’s progressive District Attorney Chesa Boudin has excused property crime as a mere “reality” amid wealth inequality 

 

Meanwhile, more suspects are being let free before their court date, even though more than half of all offenders — and three-quarters of the most violent ones — released from San Francisco jails before their trial go on to commit new crimes.

Would-be criminals rationalize what they are about to do before they do it. They think to themselves that nobody is hurt by robbing Louis Vuitton or even a Zara store. If they are clever, they might even justify to themselves that it is a good thing, since their actions redistribute wealth. Criminals since the 1960s have defended their crimes as the acts of revolutionary anti-capitalists.

Such is the logic of socialism. The real crime, according to Karl Marx and others for the last 150 years, is private property and capitalism. “Property is theft” is one of the socialist movement’s most important slogans. Thus, the argument goes, any real-world crime — from robbing Louis Vuitton to assaulting a rich person — should be viewed as a revolutionary act. Anything that takes wealth from the rich and distributes it more equally, including pain, could be considered for the greater “good.”

While criminal justice progressives say they seek “alternatives” to incarceration, those alternatives require little from the people released, not even abstinence. Such was the case with Darrell Brooks, Jr., the suspect in the killing of six people and wounding at least 40 others in Waukesha, Wis., by running them over in his car. The man had been released on $1,000 bail after running over his girlfriend, just three weeks earlier.

 

Smash-and-grab mobs have looted San Francisco stores, walking out with goods in hand and sending the message that crime is acceptable 

 

Progressives have a more simplistic vision than they let on. To the public they promise a myriad of good ideas, including electronic monitoring, assertive case management and drug rehab. But pretrial diversion and other “alternatives” to prison have allowed criminals, sometimes even homicidal ones, to simply go free.

DA Boudin has made his true intentions clear.

“The challenge going forward,” he said at the Commonwealth Club in 2020, “is how do we close a jail?”

Being soft on criminals has its consequences. For San Francisco, the result is a ghost town. For decades, this Bay Area destination has held conferences where it held itself up to the world as a model of a “livable, walkable” city.

Not any more.

“People are scared to go downtown,” native resident Tandler told me.

“This is the destruction of a city.”

NEVADA SUPREME COURT RULES ON FIREARMS LIABILITY

by Bob Walsh

Did you know that the entire first 5-6 years production of M&M candies were purchased by the War Department for issue to American servicemen? They were regarded both as a moral booster and a useful compact high energy food. 

I AM NOT SURE I BELIEVE THIS ONE

by Bob Walsh

A few days back a man showed up at an emergency hospital in the UK with a WWII anti-tank round up his ass.  The hospital called the bomb squad, and then proceeded to remove the round.  Turns out the round was inert.

He told the doctors that he just happened to fall onto the shell while he was not wearing trousers and it went up his ass.  

I somehow doubt they believed him either.

BEWARE OF ORGANIZATIONS WITH THE TERMS 'PATRIOT' OR 'PATRIOTIC' IN THEIR TITLE ..... MOST OF THOSE ORGANIZATIONS ARE NEO-NAZI GROUPS

What is the Patriot Front? White supremacist group's Downtown DC rally sparks fear

 

By Sumanti Sen  

 

meaww

December 4, 2021

 

 

Patriot Front, an American white supremacist group, was formed by Thomas Rousseau, an outspoken white supremacist. Patriot Front is perhaps the most active white supremacist group in the nation

 

A group of White supremacists rallied through downtown Washington, DC on Saturday evening, December 4, carrying American flags and plastic shields. The group was seen marching down the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to the beat of a snare drum, chanting about their plans to “reclaim America". 

The rally comprised over 100 members of the “Patriot Front” group, and was held blocks away from the White House. The group sparked fear among several bystanders, and law enforcement soon intervened to prevent any clashes from erupting. The members of the group wore a uniform comprising white gators, sunglasses, blue jackets, khaki pants, and brown boots and hats.

A beautiful night at the Lincoln Memorial interrupted by demonstrators chanting “reclaim America.“ The crowd gave them the finger and exchanged profanities.

What is Patriot Front?

Patriot Front, an American white supremacist, neo-fascist, and American nationalist hate group, was formed by Thomas Rousseau, a young man from Dallas, Texas. The group was formed back in 2017 and utilizes imagery of patriotism, liberty, and other traditional American values to promote its ideology. 

Cassie Miller, associated with the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups, said that Patriot Front is arguably the leading white supremacist group in the country. It has as many as 42 chapters, including in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The group has allegedly also posted propaganda in Delaware. "They believe the country must go through a chaotic rebirth to be restored to a mythical racially pure path," added Miller.

Patriot Front recruits online, and on college campuses with flyers, conducts flash protests. It has committed acts of vandalism on certain occasions. The group has techniques such as setting off smoke bombs during demonstrations, and chanting slogans like "Reclaim America", "Life, Liberty, Victory", "Victory or Death" and "Strong Borders, Strong Nations". Patriot Front was once known as Vanguard America. However, it changed its name after a man from the group murdered a woman at the infamous Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville.

The group had once published a manifesto, which read, in parts, "Those of foreign birth may occupy civil status within the lands occupied by the state, and they may even be dutiful citizens, yet they may not be American. Membership within the American nation is inherited through blood, not ink. Even those born in America may yet be foreign...Nationhood cannot be bestowed upon those who are not of the founding stock of our people, and those who do not share the common spirit that permeates our greater civilization, and the European diaspora...In order to survive as a culture, a heritage, and a way of being, our nation must learn that its collective interests are fighting against its collective threats of replacement and enslavement...The damage done to this nation and its people will not be fixed if every issue requires the approval and blessing from the dysfunctional American democratic system. Democracy has failed in this once great nation."

At the March on Saturday, December 4, Patriot Front’s leader Thomas Rousseau spoke beside the Capitol. “Our demonstrations are an exhibition of our unified capability to organize, to show our strength—not as brawlers or public nuisances, but as men capable of illustrating a message and seeking an America that more closely resembles the interests of its true people," he said, when asked about the reason for the march.

ORTHODOX JEWS MUST OBEY STRICT RULES ABOUT THEIR PRAYER PARAPHERNALIA

Elderly Brooklyn couple sues American Airlines after being ejected over prayer shawl

 

By Kunal Dey  

 

meaww

December 4, 2021

 

 

 Roberto informed the flight attendant that the Tallit bag could not be placed on the floor, but she was unmoved

 

An elderly couple was ejected from an American Airlines flight after refusing to place a bag containing religious material on the floor, per a lawsuit.

The "humiliating" episode unfolded when Roberto and Elana Birman were flying home to Brooklyn from Miami on Flight 322 in August. The couple, who sat in aisle seats across from each other, brought onboard only a briefcase, a purse, and a Tallit bag that carried a prayer book and shawl. MEAWW previously reported how a drunk couple was kicked off a JetBlue flight for lowering their face masks and shoving cabin crew. We also reported how a woman was removed from a Dallas-bound flight for hurling homophobic remarks.

 Roberto and Elana Birman called the incident “humiliating.”   

 

The Birmans had boarded the plane without incident, but things turned awry when a flight attendant began checking overhead bins ahead of take-off and pulled the Tallit bag from the overhead bin. “Whose is this?” she asked. When Roberto, 76, said it was his, she allegedly threw the bag on his lap and said it had to go under his seat.

“It’s a religious item, it cannot go under the seat,” Roberto explained. He went on to remove his baseball cap to reveal his kippah, noting that as an Orthodox Jew, he was forbidden to place the religious shawl on the floor. “It doesn’t matter,” the attendant allegedly responded.

Speaking to the New York Post, the couple revealed how they immigrated to the US in 1985 from Argentina, where they faced frequent anti-Semitism. “I couldn’t believe this was happening to me in America,” said Roberto. “We use these items every single day to pray," he noted. Elana Birman, 71, who has been married to Roberto for 52 years and has four kids together, likened the flight attendant’s request to asking a Christian to “throw a cross on the floor” where it could be stepped on. “Nobody said a word. Nobody defended us. It was embarrassing,” she said.

Two rabbis told the newspaper that there's a strong taboo in the Jewish faith against putting sacred items such as the Tallit bag on the floor. “It’s considered disgraceful,” said Rabbi Mitchell Rocklin. “It would be like taking a Bible or a Koran and dumping it on the floor.” 

The Birmans recalled how the pilot came over but didn't interact with them. A ground crew member was eventually summoned and escorted the elderly couple off the plane, they said. Shortly after being ushered out, the crew member told his colleagues to close the gate. “What are we, criminals?” Elana remarked, adding that her husband “was devastated.” Meanwhile, Roberto said the action was "out of proportion" to what had occurred and especially since it was the flight attendant who allegedly started it all. “She made me so nervous. I was shaking," he explained.

The embattled couple was reportedly left without Roberto's diabetes medications as they were in the checked luggage. Meanwhile, the airline allegedly did not assist them in securing food or a place to stay that night. The couple was also forced to take a taxi to a friend's residence due to an imminent hurricane. Now, they have filed a lawsuit against American Airlines for unspecified damages. “My clients were ejected from the flight based on the prejudices and complete lack of sensitivity of American Airlines employees for reasons wholly unrelated to security,” said Brad Gerstman, a lawyer representing the Birmans. “The flight attendant and pilot’s conduct was as offensive as it was illogical," he added. The airline is currently reviewing the lawsuit, a spokesman told The Post.

PEOPLE DON'T WORRY ABOUT WHETHER A COP'S FAMILY WILL EVER SEE HIM ALIVE AFTER HE LEAVES HOME TO GO ON DUTY

Texas cop shot dead in ‘senseless act of violence’ outside grocery store 

 

By Sam Raskin

 

New York Post

December 5, 2021

 

 

Officer Richard Houston was responding to a disturbance outside a grocery store when he was shot multiple times

 

A Texas police officer was shot dead Friday in a “senseless act of violence” in a “disturbance” outside a grocery store, according to officials and reports.

The officer, identified as Richard Houston, was among those responding to the disturbance around 1:40 p.m. Friday, when he was shot multiple times, the Mesquite Police Department said on its Facebook page. The cop was pronounced dead at 2:11 p.m. at Baylor Hospital, the department said.

The suspect was shot once during the altercation, according to the statement.

The alleged shooter is in critical condition at a local hospital, according to WFAA.

It’s unclear who fired their weapon first.

Witnesses told the station they were startled by the shooting. 

“It’s very close to home. I live on the other side of this Albertson’s. It’s scary,” one woman at the scene said, according to WFAA. “Whether it’s a victim or it’s a police officer, nobody deserves to be hurt like that.”

Houston was a 21-year veteran of the Mesquite police department who had racked up several accolades, according to the Mesquite police chief and the department’s Facebook post. 

 

The area outside a grocery store where Richard Houston was fatally shot 

 

“This was a senseless act of violence that ripped a loving father and husband from his family,” Chief Gill said Friday evening while tearing up. “He was a good man, a good friend, a good officer.”

Local police officials paid tribute to the fallen cop.

“We know that there’s always a possibility where one of us will have to lay down our lives,” Dallas Police Chief Eddie Garcia told WFAA. “This officer’s a hero. He did exactly that.”

 

A makeshift memorial was set up for Richard Houston after the fatal shooting 

 

In a statement, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said, “Our hearts are with the family and loved ones of the Mesquite Police Department officer who passed away this evening.”

“This tragedy is a solemn reminder of the risks our law enforcement officers take every day by putting their lives on the line to serve and protect our communities,” he added.

Mesquite Mayor Mayor Daniel Alemán Jr. announced a vigil for Houston will be held in front of the police department, according to CBS 21.

WOMAN WANTED DIVORCE ONE DAY AFTER THE WEEING ..... WOW, OUR TEXAS WOMEN ARE LIGHTNING FAST

Texas man guilty of killing wife who wanted divorce day after wedding

 

By Patrick Reilly

 

New York Post

December 5, 2021

 

 

Tareq Alkayyali, 39, of Arlington, was found guilty of strangling to death his 23-year-old wife Wasam Moussa in May 2019  

 

A Texas man found was found guilty on Friday of murdering his wife who had asked for a divorce the day after their marriage, officials said.

Tareq Alkayyali, 39, of Arlington, was found guilty of strangling to death his 23-year-old wife Wasam Moussa in May 2019 — just days after she arrived in Texas to visit her husband from her home country of Jordan, the Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney’s Office said in a release.

Hours after the verdict, a jury sentenced Alkayyali to 23 years in prison.

Assistant Tarrant County Criminal District Attorneys Allenna Bangs and Madeline Jones told the jury how Moussa was hesitant to marry Alkayyali in Jordan back in 2018, and had told her husband that she wanted a divorce the very next day.

Prosecutors said that the two never honeymooned, and Wasam returned to her family’s home with her belongings the day after the wedding. Alkayyali returned to his home and job in Arlington. During their months apart, he had an affair with one of his coworkers, officials said.

Wasam traveled to Texas to visit her husband on May 25, 2019 for a short visit during which the two argued and talked about divorce. After one of their fights, Wasam told her brother that Alkayyali covered her mouth with his hand.

“She went to the United States to try to give her husband a chance to make a life for her family,” said Moussa’s brother, Ahmad Ali, in a 2019 email to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

“She went there knowing that she had a lot of problems with him,” Ali wrote, adding that she was scared of him.

Alkayyali killed his wife on May 28, 2019, strangling her during another argument, prosecutors said. The night before she died, Alkayyali had googled how to have his wife deported, prosecutors said.

Afterward, he allegedly left her on the bed and said she had fainted. An autopsy determined she was killed by asphyxiation.

“He put his hand over her face, a person that he loved, and he watched as the light went out of her eyes,” Allenna Bangs told the jury. “What is a life worth?”

SOUNDS LIKE SCIENCE FICTION ..... BUT IT'S FOR REAL

DNA inside conch shell leads to arrest of Massachusetts cold case murder suspect

 

By Dana Kennedy

 

New York Post

December 4, 2021

Rose Marie Moniz’s cold case was solved when authorities tested DNA samples from a conch shell used to kill her

 DNA from the conch shell ultimately led to David Reed being indicted for the gruesome murder

 

That’s a shell of a good job.

Cold case detectives solved a 20-year-old murder in Massachusetts thanks to DNA they recovered from the inside of the murder weapon: a conch shell.

David Reed, 53, formerly of Acushnet and New Bedford, was indicted last week by a grand jury in connection with the death of Rose Marie Moniz inside her New Bedford home, according to Bristol District Attorney Thomas Quinn III.

Reed is Moniz’ half-brother, ABC News reported Friday. He also served as one of the pallbearers at her funeral, according to WPRI-TV.

Moniz, 41, was found in a pool of blood on the bathroom floor on March 23, 2001 by her father, who had come to take her to a previously scheduled doctor’s appointment, prosecutors said.

She’d been beaten to death with a fireplace poker, a conch shell and a cast iron kettle, police said. Her purse was emptied on the floor and cash had been taken, cops said.

The investigation went cold until it was reopened by the cold case unit in 2019.

 

Rose Marie Moniz was found beaten to death in her home on March 23, 2001

 

Investigators figured out that injuries to Moniz’s face had been caused by the spiny exterior of the conch shell, suggesting the suspect would have had to have his fingers inside the shell to hold it, ABC News reported.

Testing of the interior revealed a full DNA profile that was run through a national database and eventually led to Reed, prosecutors said.

Reed has also been indicted in connection with the attempted murder and robbery of another New Bedford woman in 2003, prosecutors said.

VIOLENT LA CRIME WAVE, JACQUELINE AVANT KILLING RESULT OF LIBERAL JUSTICE REFORMS

LAPD detective: “It’s a shit show over here. Bad guys are released quicker than we can finish the paper work, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.”

 

By Isabel Vincent, Michael Kaplan and Dana Kennedy  

New York Post

December 4, 2021

A security guard stands outside a Nordstrom store in Los Angeles where police say a group of thieves smashed windows at the department store on Nov. 23

 

A day after a career criminal was arrested in the fatal shooting of philanthropist Jacqueline Avant at the lavish Beverly Hills home she shared with her husband Clarence, a 90-year-old music producer inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame this year, her family issued a statement that read in part, “Now, let justice be served.”

But in Los Angeles, where left-wing lawmakers and activists have pushed a litany of progressive reforms that help violent criminals spend less-time behind bars, justice is not only fleeting — it’s twisted, critics say.

“It’s a s–t show over here,” said LAPD Det. Jamie McBride, a director of the Los Angeles Police Protective League, a police union. “Bad guys are released quicker than we can finish the paper work, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.”

The Avants — whose daughter Nicole is a former ambassador to the Bahamas and married to Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos, had been living a comfortable life in their sprawling 4,000 square foot , $7 million home in the ritzy Trousdale Estates neighborhood for decades, friends said. 

But the elderly couple’s quiet lives were upended at around 2:23 a.m. Wednesday when cops say career criminal Aariel Maynor broke into their home and fatally shot Jacqueline Avant, 81. Clarence Avant was home but not hurt.

The couple also employed a security guard, who was shot at by the suspect but not hit or injured in any way, according to Beverly Hills Police Chief Mark Stainbrook.

The Avants hired the guard to protect them from a different type of L.A intruder — fans of the recent Netflix documentary about Avant called the “Black Godfather” who were dropping by the house uninvited, he said. 

 

Jacqueline Avant was recently murdered in her home by career criminal Aariel Maynor 

Avant’s alleged killer was arrested Thursday in Jacqueline Avant’s murder after being caught in another botched robbery in nearby Hollywood in which he shot himself in the foot.

Maynor, who is currently hospitalized under armed guard, was in violation of parole at the time of his arrest and “it didn’t sound as if he was reporting to his parole agent at all,” Stainbrook said. Police say he will be charged Monday.

The 29-year-old was no stranger to the criminal justice system, records show. He was sentenced to a five-year prison term in 2013 for second degree robbery and inflicting bodily harm, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

And he recently served a four-year sentence for second-degree robbery with enhancements for a previous felony and was released on supervised parole on Sept. 1.

 

Aariel Maynor, who was charged with the murder of Jacqueline Avant, was caught nearby about an hour after the shooting 

 

“With this guy’s history, with prison priors, he absolutely should still be in jail,” said McBride “He should have gotten a longer sentence. For his rap sheet and the violent crimes he’s been involved in, he should never have been offered a plea bargain.”

Cops still don’t know if anything was taken from the Avant house, authorities said. The suspect then drove to a home in Hollywood where a father and his 17-year-old daughter were home, Stainbrook said.

The suspect allegedly took items from the house before shooting himself in the foot in the backyard which alerted someone to call the cops, Stainbrook added. 

 

Broken glass seen outside the Avants’ home after the shooting 

 

Stainbrook, McBride and others say that liberal justice reform policies, spurred by groups such as Black Lives Matter and Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom have made it increasingly difficult for police to do their jobs.

“The criminals know they can do whatever they want,” Stainbrook told The Post. “Then multiply that by all the prisoners released from jail because of the coronavirus and the no-bail and it’s a nightmare and very frustrating from our end of it.”

Many are blaming the recent statewide spike in crime, including a spate of looting, on the criminal justice reforms, including Proposition 47, a 2014 law that is intended to keep non violent criminals out of crowded prisons and treat low level criminals with more compassion. The law doubled the amount a suspect could steal to be considered a felony from $450 to $950.

 

“It’s a shit show over here,” said LAPD Det. Jamie McBride. “Bad guys are released quicker than we can finish the paper work, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.”

Activist groups, along with celebrities such as Brad Pitt, John Legend and Jay Z famously supported the reform, arguing African Americans were unfairly targeted for years and the measure would help save the state tens of millions in incarceration fees for petty criminals.

The reform was backed by Newsom, then California’s Lt. Governor, along with LA District Attorney George Gascon, among other Democrats.

“Proposition 47 has bolstered criminals because they know that if they are caught stealing the consequences are minimal,” said Mark Powell, a former reserve police officer in San Diego, in a recent opinion article in the Times of San Diego.

McBride said that in recent weeks he has caught many suspects entering the prices of stolen items into their telephone calculators so as not to go over $950 for a one-time robbery.

 

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti speaks outside the Los Angeles Police Headquarters 

 

“You can essentially walk into a store here, take up to $1000 in items, walk out, get a ticket and get released,” Stainbrook said. “We are arresting the same people over and over.”

The election last year of 40-year top cop Gascon, 67, to the position of LA District Attorney was the icing on the cake, some say. Gascon, like prosecutors elected in recent years in Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Chicago and Fairfax County, Va. was backed in part by billionaire leftist George Soros.

The Cuban-born Gascon, who moved with his family to the US in 1967, delivered an inauguration speech in Dec. 2020 in which he sounded more like a social justice activist than a law enforcement officer.

“Our rush to incarcerate generations of kids of color,” he said in his speech, has torn apart “the social fabric of our communities. The status quo hasn’t made us safe.”

The Avant home invasion is far from an isolated incident in LA’s wealthy show-biz enclaves.

Last month BET host Terrence Jenkins was shot near his home in Sherman Oaks. In October, robbers made off with some $1 million in jewelry stolen from the home of “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” mainstay Dorit Kemsley.

 

Police are seeking the public’s help in identifying the suspects who robbed “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” star Dorit Kemsley at her Encino home on Oct. 27

 

On Friday, Avant’s neighbor in Trousdale Estates, nestled in the foothills of the Santa Monica mountains, recounted other violent incidents in the area.

“Today there was another incident on Bedford Drive,” Vida Ardebilchi said in an interview. “Somebody went into the house at seven in the morning and got trapped in a room. The SWAT team was called and then he [the intruder] slit his wrists when he realized he could not get out. He slit his wrists and died in the house. There was another incident where a guy got attacked on Sunset Strip and got shot in the head for his Rolex watch.” 

Ardebilchi said that members of the community now want to build gates for their street and hire more private security.

 

A security guard was assaulted as a group of looters fled with $25,000 worth of merch from a Nordstrom store in LA.abc7

 

Trousdale Estates does not have a guard gate like some of the newer ultra-wealthy gated communities in the area. Police sources told The Post that Maynor would have been able to enter the neighborhood without being stopped by guards.

“It’s disappointing and the fault of the government.” Ardebilchi continued. “We all say it’s terrible and nobody does anything about it. I don’t feel safe in our neighborhood anymore.”

Friends of Avant, a former model from Queens, were shocked by her death in what is considered one of the safest and wealthiest parts of Los Angeles.

Former United Nations ambassador Andrew Young, a longtime friend of the couple said in an interview.

“I’ve been agonizing over what happened, how it happened, what the meaning of all this is. Jacqui and Clarence had a guard at the gate. I’m wondering how it could have happened. This is a big mystery. They had no enemies in town. Everybody loved Clarence and Jacqui.”

 

Aariel Maynor is accused of shooting and killing Jacqueline Avant

And criminals love Beverly Hills.

“It’s a bigger target,” McBride said. “We arrest these crooks but they are not staying in jail. If they know it is a property crime they figure nothing will happen to them. So why not go for the big dollars in Beverly Hills?” In the last few years, the LAPD had to create a special unit just for home invasions in the enclave, he said.

“People get followed home and then they get robbed,” McBride told The Post. “The only thing missing from LA is Kurt Russell driving up in an eye patch, like in ‘Escape From New York.’ It all goes back to our liberal politics.”

A FLYING PIG MUST HAVE PULLED THE TRIGGER ..... IF NOT THE PIG, THEN THE TOOTH FAIRY MUST HAVE DONE IT

Alex Baldwin insists he never pulled the trigger of the gun.  Claims he pulled back the hammer of the vintage Colt 45, and when he let go of the hammer, the gun went off

By Howie Katz

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                         Alec is holding a gun! ... Quick everyone, run for cover!

 

Unless you live under a rock you should know that on October 21, 2021Alec Baldwin accidentally killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and wounded director Joel Souza with a prop gun on a movie set near Santa Fe, New Mexico. 

To begin with, Hutchins and Souza would not have been shot had Baldwin not violated the cardinal rule of gun safety: Never point a gun - loaded or empty, real or fake - at anyone unless you intend to kill them.

The gun fired by Baldwin was an Itakian made replica of a vintage Colt 45 similar to the one pictured here

During an interview with ABC's George Stephanopoulos, Baldwin insists he never pulled the trigger of the gun.  Claims he pulled back the hammer of the vintage Colt 45, and when he let go of the hammer, the gun went off.

Several gun experts say that the gun might possibly go off like Baldwin claimed, but such an accidental discharge is so rare, that the actor is "full of shit."

However, Baldwin is an outspoken Democrat, so he wouldn't lie about how the gun went off.  But if not Baldwin, who would have pulled the trigger?

An angry flying pig must have pulled the trigger.

And if not the pig, then the tooth fairy must have done it.

Unless he can prove a flying pig or the tooth fairy pulled the trigger, Baldwin should be charged and tried for manslaughter (Hutchins) and attempted manslaughter (Souza).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If convicted, Baldwin should be sentenced to serve time in prison instead of being put on probation.  A small price to pay for killing one person and wounding another.

ADDENDUM: By the way, if that tooth fairy is still buzzing around inside or outside your head, you can call on the fella pictured below for help.

 

 

He'll get rid of that pest for you.

MANY OF THE STUDENTS THAT ARE NOW GRIEVING WERE ADVOCATES FOR THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORMS NEW YORKERS ARE COMPLAINING ABOUT

Columbia-area stabbings are the price NYC pays for its feckless criminal-justice ‘reforms’

Post Editorial Board

 

New York Post

December 3, 2021 

 

 

Students and others gather on Columbia University campus night after the stabbing death of student Davide Giri. Most of those students in all likelihood were advocates for th bail reform that led to Giri's death

 

 

Sow the wind, they say, and reap the whirlwind. That is, empower criminals and New York City will suffer.

As did Davide Giri, a 30-year-old native of Italy and a Columbia University PhD candidate who was randomly knifed to death just off campus Thursday night. It was a senseless crime that terrified the neighborhood and now shames the city before the world.

Is it the new normal? Would Giri alive today if New York’s political class hadn’t abandoned the policies and practices that had kept the city safe for two decades?

Perhaps yes, on both counts.

But this much is certain: New York set out deliberately two-plus years ago to disconnect punishment from crime —  “reforming” bail, hobbling prosecutors, emptying jails and prisons and otherwise empowering  criminals at the expense of the innocent.

Innocents like Davide Giri. And criminals like his alleged assassin, 25-year-old parolee Vincent Pinkney — who police say is a member of the Every Body Killas street gang with a long criminal record.

Giri was fatally attacked around 11 p.m. Thursday, and a second man was stabbed moments later, also allegedly by Pinkney — who police suspect in a third assault Wednesday night. It all took place in a not-so-long-ago peaceful neighborhood that has seen a 27 percent increase in serious assaults this year alone.

That, of course, is just one more frightening statistic in a city now beset by violent crime — so much so that Bank of America wants its Wall Street-area workforce to dress down when they come to work so as not to attract muggers and other criminals.

What a corrosive, if necessary, message to send when pandemic-battered businesses all over town are coaxing their employees to come back to the office.

Yes, tourism — a vital element in the city’ economy — is picking up.

But Giri, again, was an Italian national, as was the second man knifed Thursday night, a tourist in town for all of one day. He’s going to survive, but you can bet that the attacks will be noticed overseas.

There is, of course, much more involved here than downtown dress codes and the tourist trade, as economically critical as it is.

Mayor-elect Adams has promised to make crime reduction a priority, but he’ll be squaring off against a City Council and state Legislature committed to continuing — indeed, expanding — the policies that brought the city to its current sad state. He’s going to be pushing a big rock up a steep hill.

So root for him as if the city’s future depends on him winning that battle. Because it does.

THE SMASH-AND-GRABBERS KNOW THAT AS LOMG AS THE DO NOT HURT ANYONE, THEY LIKELY WON'T BE PUT IN JAIL

‘Flash mob’ robberies roiling U.S. retailers, traumatizing workers

 

By Abha Bhattarai and Gerrit De Vynck

 

The Washington Post

December 3, 2021 

A group of about 40 to 50 teenage shoplifters made off with an unknown amount of jewelry and other items in Hayward, California, on Sunday. Experts and officials say national crime networks are behind many of the 'smash-and-grab ' operations

 

A spate of brazen store heists, in which organized mobs have hit stores as varied as Nordstrom, Best Buy, Louis Vuitton and Home Depot, has shaken the retail industry and created fresh challenges for law enforcement.

While large-scale “smash-and-grabs” have been on the rise this year, experts say they hit critical mass in late November, when stores were piled high with holiday inventory. On Black Friday alone, a crew of eight made off with $400 worth of sledgehammers, crowbars and hammers from a Home Depot in Lakewood, Calif.; a group ransacked a Bottega Veneta boutique in Los Angeles; and roughly 30 people swarmed a Best Buy near Minneapolis, grabbing electronics.

Retail executives and security experts say the rise of such robberies — which have gone viral online and in some cases, spurred copycats — is the culmination of several factors, including a shortage of security guards, reluctance by police and prosecutors to pursue shoplifting offenses, and the growing use of social media as an organizational tool. They also coincide with a pullback from pandemic-era protocols that limited the number of people who could enter a store at one time.

The incidents have spooked workers, retailers say, as they can involve dozens of people swarming in with crowbars, guns and other weapons and breaking glass. Some have resulted in injuries: Two Nordstrom employees were assaulted and one was pepper-sprayed Nov. 20 after an estimated 80 people rushed the Walnut Creek store.

Best Buy chief executive Corie Barry says the high-profile events have made it more difficult to hire staff, particularly in shoplifting hot spots along the West Coast.

“This is a real issue that hurts and scares real people,” she said during an earnings call last week. “This is traumatizing for our associates and is unacceptable.

It also exposes the limitations of security mainstays such as cameras, electronic tags and even a well-positioned security guard, which might deter a shoplifter but have little efficacy against an unruly crowd.

Law enforcement officials say social media is increasingly playing a role in the organization and promotion of such events. Several recent store robberies in the San Francisco area, including at Burberry, Bloomingdale’s, Yves Saint Laurent, Walgreens and Fendi, were likely organized on social media apps, said Fran Clader, director of communications for the California Highway Patrol, which has a task force dedicated to investigating organized retail theft.

She said the agency has investigated similar incidents in which the thieves didn’t know one another in advance. “The crimes in those cases were organized by a specific suspect that used a social media messaging application to plan and execute the offense,” she said.

Videos of the coordinated mass robberies — showing people running out of stores with goods, jumping into cars and speeding off, as well as footage of police chasing and arresting suspected thieves — have gone viral on TikTok, YouTube and other social media platforms in recent weeks. Such content could be inspiring “copycat” thefts around the country, although it’s hard to know for sure because the FBI doesn’t collect specific data on these kinds of crimes, said Scott Decker, a professor emeritus of criminology at Arizona State University.

It’s likely the crimes were organized via messaging apps or email, but not in an extremely structured way, he said, with plans being passed to different people who may not know each other in the real world.

“It’s the organizing capability of the Internet that I think is really attractive to offenders,” said Decker, who studies mass burglaries. “Is this the start of a new trend or copycat offending?”

“Flash mob” thefts have been pervasive in California as well as Chicago, where some prosecutors have stopped pursuing shoplifting cases under $1,000, said Jeff Zisner, chief executive of workplace security firm Aegis. Three-quarters of U.S. retailers reported an increase in organized crime last year, according to the National Retail Federation. The trade group says such shoplifting incidents now cost retailers an average $700,000 for every $1 billion in sales.

Last month, large groups ransacked luxury stores throughout the San Francisco area. There were similar incidents in other parts of the state, including two Nordstrom stores in the Los Angeles area, an Apple store in Santa Rosa and a Lululemon store in San Jose.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) said this week that shoplifters should be prosecuted and vowed to “significantly increase … efforts to go after these retail rings.” He also said he would ramp up police presence along highways and retail corridors. And though the state typically classifies thefts under $950 as misdemeanors instead of felonies, Newsom urged local law enforcement officials to be more forceful in going after organized retail crime.

“If people are breaking in, people stealing your property, they need to be arrested,” he said Wednesday. “Police need to arrest them. Prosecutors need to prosecute them. Judges need to hold people accountable for breaking the law. These are not victimless crimes, and I have no empathy for these criminal elements.”

Barry, of Best Buy, says the company is locking up high-value products and hiring extra security guards. A spokeswoman for Nordstrom, which has been a frequent target, said the chain is positioning security guards both in and outside its stores, and it is partnering with mall security and law enforcement to anticipate risks.

“Dealing with run-of-the-mill shoplifting is like whack-a-mole where you’re going after individuals after they commit a crime,” Zisner said. “But something like this — where it’s 50 people against one security guard — requires long-term policies.”

Retailers, he said, increasingly are requesting additional security guards and retired police officers, although a shortage of available workers has made it difficult to meet demand. Stores are also looking for new ways to deter theft, starting with bright lights and conspicuously placed security cameras in parking lots.

“It’s a perfect storm of opportunity that folks are clearly exploiting,” Zisner said. “Historically, we’d only see this at high-end stores where you could pick up a few things and be out with $5,000 worth of stuff, but now it’s even happening at Home Depot.”

The home improvement giant has been seeing an increase in organized retail crime for several years, said Home Depot spokeswoman Christina Cornell. As a result, the chain also has begun locking up high-dollar items and is working with Stanley Black & Decker developing a pilot program that blocks the ability to turn on certain power tools unless they have gone through proper check-out protocols.

“The value of any product is in its ability to work correctly — and if these products aren’t purchased properly, they just won’t work,” Cornell said. “That’s the next natural step here: figuring out where this stuff goes and preventing it from being valuable to resellers.”

Most items are quickly sold online, on platforms such as eBay and Facebook Marketplace, where it’s easy to remain anonymous, security experts said. But they say the Internet has contributed to the rise of theft in other ways by allowing would-be offenders to coordinate efforts and share footage.

Even Congress and federal law enforcement authorities have taken note. A bill introduced in the House this fall would require e-commerce marketplaces, such as Amazon and eBay, to verify the identities of third-party merchants that sell more than $5,000 worth of goods a year. The FBI is also collaborating with retailers to curb large-scale thefts in stores.

“We can’t arrest or prosecute our way out of this,” said Barbara Staib, a spokeswoman for the National Association for Shoplifting Prevention. “We need to change our approach.”