Contrails or vapour trails are line-shaped clouds produced by aircraft engine exhaust or changes in air pressure, typically at aircraft cruising altitudes several kilometres/miles above the Earth's surface. They are composed primarily of water, in the form of ice crystals..
What happens to a citizen when hundreds of images of child pornography are found on their computer and phone? Well, if you are a law enforcement officer, the answer is, nothing.
An investigation into the New Orleans Police Department has revealed a disturbing lack of discipline for individuals who've been caught and accused of despicable acts.
The
residents of a Mandeville neighborhood felt safe knowing that a 16-year
veteran of the NOPD, Sgt Bradley Wax lived down their street. However,
that would quickly change after Wax was arrested and charged with 38 counts of possessing child pornography.
The Louisiana Attorney General's office conducted a search on Wax's
personal computer and other electronic devices and found them to be full
of explicit photos of young children.
He was obviously fired
immediately and not allowed to be a cop any longer, right? Or at the
very least he was suspended until the trial, right? Wrong. WDSU, who
carried out the independent investigation, found that Wax was initially suspended but has since returned to work as normal, working in fleet management at the NOPD headquarters.
"It's
incredibly hard to imagine anyone in that capacity would be back
working and being paid for it at taxpayer expense," said Dr. John Penny,
criminologist at Southern University at New Orleans.
It is
indeed hard to imagine how any morally sound establishment would
continue to allow a man, who was found in possession of so much child
pornography that he faces more than 500 years behind bars if convicted,
to continue to draw a salary as a cop.
But to the NOPD, it's business as usual.
Wax's scenario is not an isolated incident either. WDSU
found more than a half-dozen officers charged with everything from child
porn to the state's most serious sexual assault charge, aggravated
rape.
NOPD Officer Michael Thomassie was another one. Thomassie
was accused and arrested on charges of aggravated rape over a year ago.
However, when WDSU investigators went to New Orlean's 4th district,
they found Thomassie currently still working as a cop.
While
these officers were initially suspended, as soon as the spotlight moved
on, they were silently allowed back across the blue line.
Naturally, the department has declined an interview about this situation, but they have released the following statement:
"An emergency suspension is generally used as a tool for emergency situations when an officer has been arrested and is physically unable to come to work and perform their duties. Once the officer is able to return to work, they are reassigned to administrative duties pending the outcome of an investigation. Based on civil service rules, officers are disciplined after an investigation is completed and a formal disciplinary hearing has been held."
Apparently it takes the NOPD more than a year to conduct an
investigation and find guilt in a man whose iPhone was a pedophile's
paradise. Of course, everyone, even the vilest of criminals deserves the
right to due process. But the double standard here is where the issue
arises.
These people claim the responsibility of upholding the law. When they are the ones suspected of violating that law, they should be held to a much higher standard, not a lower one.
"It
sends a very dangerous message to the citizens of this community," said
Dr. Penny. "The appropriate action was taken; now you step back from
that and put them, back to work and pay them, and it sends an incredibly
dangerous message."
The message it sends is that police are above the law...
More -
http://www.sott.net/article/296606-Multiple-officers-charged-with-possession-of-child-porn-one-accused-of-raping-a-child-still-working-in-New-Orleans?utm_source=twitterfeed
Leaseholders still have inadequate protection from unscrupulous landlords, as Noelle Rawe, a Knightsbridge leaseholder, has found to her cost. When her landlord, a secretive British Virgin Islands-registered company, sent her a very large bill for major repairs, she quite legitimately questioned the works proposed. She then received a solicitors's letter threatening her with the forfeiture of her lease if she didn't pay up. She has now spent £30,000 on solicitor's, barrister's and surveyor's fees fighting her case in the Leasehold Valuation Tribunal (LVT) and the County Court.
Noelle's problems began in early July, 2002, when her landlord put in a service charge demand of £736,000, to be shared between the 35 mainly studio flats in her block. Her share of the bill came to £14,400 for works that included the redecoration and re-roofing of the block, and a new lift and main boiler. An earlier letter from the managing agent had indicated that the final bill might rise to more than £1.5 million, which would have put her share at about £30,000.
In August of last year, the landlord applied to the LVT for a determination that the landlord's demands were reasonable - and Noelle decided to contest it. "The Government presents the LVTs as a forum where flat-owners can challenge service charges without the need for professional representation and where each party pays their own costs."
In practice, Noelle says, this is not what happens. "For the four days of hearings between February and April, I employed a barrister and a surveyor. Without them I wouldn't have stood a chance - and still the outcome was unsatisfactory." The final report found evidence of overcharging. It also stated that the landlord should use the sinking fund of nearly £142,000 to fund part of the works, something that it was refusing to do. But the tribunal was unable to pass judgment on all aspects of the service charge because the landlord had not provided sufficient information.
In other words, the tribunal failed to give Noelle what she needed: a definitive ruling on what was a reasonable level of service charge, plus a summary of its findings. And, in a move that borders on harrassment, the landlord didn't wait for the tribunal to rule before issuing proceedings against leaseholders for non-payment of the service charge. "In March this year, I received a charging order from the court. I then discovered that a charging order can only be pursued when judgment has been passed against me, which it hadn't."
Noelle is still no nearer to agreeing the service charges with her landlord. "It has reduced my bill, but is still refusing to use the sinking fund, and I still don't know if the amount I am being asked to pay is fair, as parts of the works have not been specified. Other leaseholders have just paid up, but I refuse to be intimidated. Fighting it has cost me a large part of my savings, and it has taken up most of my spare time over the past 20 months.
"I have also seen other cases where the LVT has failed to give clear guidance. The problem is that it is only able to assess the reasonableness of service charges, not the liability to pay. This changed recently when the LVT's jurisdiction was widened, but we will have to wait and see whether this results in better decisions.
"I am also critical of the new 'right to manage' law which, in theory, gives leaseholders the right to manage their own block without having to prove that their landlord is negligent or overcharging them. In practice, the law is not very leaseholder-friendly. Leaseholders will have to set up a "right to manage company", which is expensive, and the landlord will continue to have power - as a member of the "right to manage" company who can sit on the board, and with the right to take the service charge to the LVT.
"As an organisation, CARL continues to demand the abolition of the leasehold system. At the moment, leaseholders are getting ripped off by unscrupulous landlords simply because, unlike Noelle Rawe, most simply pay up when they see that it is cheaper than hiring solicitors, barristers and surveyors to fight their case."
It is twenty years since the government passed the 1989 Children Act and one year since Baby Peter's killers were convicted. Judging by the latest statistics, many lessons have still to be learned.
Referrals of vulnerable young people to councils' children's services departments have rocketed having previously been going down - while there has been a corresponding leap in the numbers of applications by local authorities to take children into care.
The so-called Baby P effect is still going strong.
It took a while to manifest itself. Baby Peter died at the hands of his mother, her boyfriend and her lodger in August 2007, but the spike in care applications did not happen until after the court case in November 2008, which uncovered the scale of Baby Peter's neglect, abuse and the terrible circumstances of his death. Lord Laming's review of child protection in England, published on 12 March made clear that councils should err on the side of caution when deciding whether to begin care proceedings. Unsurprisingly, therefore referrals to children's services departments and applications to take young people into care have continued to rise steadily ever since.
But regional disparities are still apparent. Even accounting for population sizes, why is it that Birmingham, Lancashire, Hampshire, Kent and Leeds have the highest number of children with child protection plans due to sexual abuse, or that Birmingham has the most number of young people with child protection plans due to emotional abuse than the whole of the North East put together?
It could simply be that these areas have the most effective - or cautious depending how you look at it - children's services departments. Or other areas might be better at preventing abuse, thereby avoiding the need for more serious intervention in the future. Either way, the regional figures from the DCSF make for fascinating reading.
What do you think? Have we learnt anything since Baby P and the Children Act?
