Loveland, Colorado, will pay $3 million to settle police-brutality case where the victim was a 73-year-old woman -- at 5-feet and 80 pounds, with dementia

The brutalization of Karen Garner, 73

A Colorado city has settled a police-brutality lawsuit, where the victim was a 73-year-old woman with dementia. Loveland, CO, police responded to a complaint from Wal-Mart employees who said Karen Garner walked out of the store without paying for several items. The cops hog-tied Garner, beat her up, and left her with serious injuries. She is 5-feet and weighs 80 pounds. From a report at the Denver Post:

What started last year in Loveland with a 73-year-old woman with dementia trying to leave Walmart with $13.88 in unpaid merchandise ended Wednesday with the city agreeing to pay a $3-million civil settlement.

The city of Loveland announced it will settle a federal lawsuit Karen Garner and her family brought after Garner was violently arrested by police in June 2020, bringing an end to a months-long saga that prompted widespread outrage, ended the careers of three Loveland police officers and brought about a third-party investigation into the police department.

“This settlement brings a measure of justice to the Garner family, but it does not deliver full justice,” the family’s attorney, Sarah Schielke, said during a news conference. “Full justice to Karen Garner and this community will happen at the moment that every individual who participated in this atrocity and who fostered the conditions and culture that made its happening possible is held accountable.”

Schielke called on Loveland Police Chief Bob Ticer to resign:

“We need change, we need them to change,” said Garner’s daughter, Alissa Swartz.

Ticer said he has no intention of resigning.

“I understand the emotion, I understand those demands,” he said. “But my responsibility here is to ensure the investigations (into the Garner incident) that are moving forward are handled professionally.”

How could a forgetful act by a small, elderly woman lead to such an ugly event? For one thing, it involved grossly unprofessional police behavior. The Denver Post reports:

In June 2020, Garner had started to walk out of a Walmart store in Loveland without paying for her items when she was stopped by employees, who took the items back. Employees still called Loveland police and Officer Austin Hopp confronted Garner as she was walking home, throwing the woman to the ground. Hopp broke Garner’s arm and dislocated her shoulder during the arrest, according to the lawsuit.

Video shows Hopp, Officer Daria Jalali and Officer Tyler Blackett later laughing about the arrest as Garner sat in a nearby cell. They rewatched the body camera footage and Hopp asked, “Ready for the pop?” Schielke said it was the sound of Hopp dislocating Garner’s shoulder.

Hopp, Jalali and Blackett all resigned from the police department. Hopp and Jalali, who were both involved in the arrest, are also facing criminal charges. Sgt. Phil Metzler, a supervising officer who responded to the scene and approved the use of force, is still on paid leave from the department.

A third-party investigation into the police department’s handling of the incident has concluded, but the results may not be public for several months, city officials said in a statement.

Why was any use of force needed in such a situation? Documents show multiple police officials signed off on it:

The settlement announcement follows Schielke’s release Tuesday of an internal police report that shows three different police supervisors signed off on Hopp’s use of force against Garner, as well as the release of body-camera footage that shows Metzler dismissing a bystander’s concerns about the incident. Ticer declined to address the supervisors’ approvals, except to point out that Hopp faces charges related to deception.

“That is why we have a comprehensive third-party investigation evaluating that and any other policies in the department that may or may not have been applicable in this arrest,” he said.

Ticer said that Garner’s arrest led to a change in the police department’s use-of-force review process. Use-of-force incidents are now reviewed by an assistant city attorney and city of Loveland human resources personnel, instead of just by police personnel.

“There is no excuse, under any circumstances, for what happened to Ms. Garner,” Ticer said. “We have agreed on steps we need to take to begin building back trust. Trust is very important. While these actions won’t change what Ms. Garner experienced, they will serve to improve this police department and hopefully restore faith that the LPD exists to serve those who live in and visit Loveland.”

The litigation process helped reveal a touching letter Garner had written several years ago:

The $3 million settlement will need to be approved by a probate court, and should be finalized within two or three months, Schielke said.

Swartz, Garner’s daughter, said the settlement money will be used to pay for the 24/7 dementia care that her mother now requires. When the family was considering whether to settle the case or continue to fight in court, she was guided by a letter Garner wrote years ago, when she knew dementia would later take hold of her.

The family discovered the letter a few weeks ago when going through Garner’s belongings.

“All I wanted all my life was someone to love, adore and care about,” she wrote. “And I find the world scary now, being alone. So value love as a treasured gift. It is all that matters. I want the best and fullest life possible for my children and grandchildren, and I feel the world is getting crueler. Don’t make it any rougher on yourselves by living in the past. Look out the front window and don’t dwell on what is in the rearview mirror.”

Lindsey Graham's suggestion that Putin's assassination, as an inside job, might end Russia's war in Ukraine draws bipartisan heat from sober minds

Lindsey Graham

 

U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) has drawn fire from both sides of the political aisle for saying out loud what many Westerners probably are thinking: that the best way to end the war in Ukraine would be for someone inside Russia to assassinate President Vladimir Putin.

Graham's remarks probably have drawn thumbs up from bar stools across North America and Europe. But they have met with disapproval from those in higher circles, mostly in the form of "we don't do things like that here, and we certainly don't talk with such crudeness." Those points are well taken, but as someone who is not prone to defend the likes of Lindsey Graham, I will give him credit for this: At least he did not side with Putin and call his invasion of Ukraine an act of "genius" -- like another right-wing political figure with loose lips. And in fairness, we've seen signs that Graham's words have been misinterpreted in some quarters.

Many of Graham's critics have reacted with no sign of uncertainty. Politico, for example, called his statements an act of "stupidity." From opinion writer Jack Shafer:

Sen. Lindsey Graham’s call for a Russian citizen to perform a hit job on Vladimir Putin is such a self-evidently terrible idea that even Ted Cruz, himself a bottomless lode of 24-carat wretched thinking, dunked on its stupidity.

Graham proposed Putin’s assassination on both a Thursday broadcast of “Hannity” and on his Twitter feed. “Is there a Brutus in Russia?” Graham asked on Twitter. “The only way this ends is for somebody in Russia to take this guy out. You would be doing your country — and the world — a great service.”

As if addressing a five-year-old, Cruz used his brief tweet to explain to his fellow Republican senator that the assassination of a foreign head of state was not something that belonged in the American playbook. Sanction Russia, Cruz argued, provide military aid to the Ukrainians, boycott Russian gas and oil, but don’t encourage someone to whack him.

It probably is quite a feat to make Ted Cruz sound like the adult in the room. But Graham pulled it off,  and he caused NPR to provide background on his comments:

Sen. Lindsey Graham's suggestion that Russians should assassinate President Vladimir Putin has drawn the ire of Republicans and Democrats concerned over the war in Ukraine.

"Is there a Brutus in Russia? Is there a more successful Colonel Stauffenberg in the Russian military?" the South Carolina Republican asked in a tweet.

Roman Emperor Julius Caesar was assassinated by Brutus and others in the Rome Senate on the Ides of March. Graham was also referring to German Lt. Col. Claus von Stauffenberg, who tried to kill Adolf Hitler in the summer of 1944.

"The only way this ends is for somebody in Russia to take this guy out. You would be doing your country - and the world - a great service," Graham said.

Asked about the remarks during the White House news briefing on Friday afternoon, press secretary Jen Psaki said, "That is not the position of the United States government and certainly not a statement you'd hear come from the mouth of anybody working in this administration."

Why does Politico consider Graham's remarks stupid. Shafer seems to acknowledge that such statements have a certain low-level appeal. But he also suggests there are better ways to achieve peace -- and along the way -- he provides some fascinating history on the subject of political hit jobs; even the American government, it turns out, has not always been on the side of restraint in such matters:

The pitch to terminate Putin, Julius Caesar-style, may sound appealing. Who among us has never wished a maximally violent end on an evil dictator who is committing monstrous acts? But that’s not the way our government works anymore. Assigning Putin’s death might be plausible if we were already at war with Russia, but we’re not — yet! And the unintended consequences of murdering Putin need our consideration before we think of locking and loading.

Since President Gerald R. Ford prohibited the assassination of foreign leaders with an executive order in 1976, political assassination has been off the United States’ books (at least formally). But it wasn’t always that way. In the early 1960s, the U.S. government formulated several attempts and plans to kill Cuban leader Fidel Castro using exploding cigars, a pair of murderous mobsters, a femme fatale, an exploding seashell and a poison pen. One reason the U.S. backed away from assassinations was the loss of its own chief executive, John F. Kennedy, to a sniper’s rifle. As long as the U.S. maintained anything like an assassination bureau, it tacitly endorsed the legality of foreign nations setting up their own killing squads to take out our president. Graham may think he insulated President Joe Biden from Russian retaliation by assigning the death of Putin to a Russian, but think how well that argument would hold up if Putin ordered today that some American play Brutus in the coming days by ridding the world of Biden.

Yes, two can play the political-assassination game, and that might be the single strongest argument against Graham's line of thinking. Shafer goes a few steps further:

Granted, killing Putin would eliminate the architect of the criminal invasion of Ukraine. But we have no assurance that his replacement would reverse his military actions. We don’t even have a sound idea of who stands to inherit control of Russia or even an inkling of whether or not Putin’s absolute power would be handed down to just one new strongman. It’s conceivable that a Putin assassination would initiate a deadly, chaotic power struggle among top Kremlin and military leaders, whose outcome cannot be accurately predicted. For instance, who wants to see three or four Russian factions, each with nuclear capability, battling one another? Will one of them be authorized to make peace with the West or will we end up with several new nuclear adversaries instead of one? Never forget what followed the hanging of Saddam Hussein and the murder of Muammar Gaddafi. The death of a strongman almost never serves the remedy we seek.

It might be a different matter had Graham called for the assassination of Putin after the United States declared war on Russia. In times of absolute war, heads of state are legitimate targets. But no such state of war currently exists between our two countries. Did anybody in the U.S. Senate recommend the assassination of Nikita Khrushchev when he invaded Hungary or place an order for Leonid Brezhnev’s hide after he sent tanks into Czechoslovakia?

U.S. sponsorship of Putin’s assassination also could easily backfire if Russians interpreted his killing as an act of American escalation that would unite them in favor of new acts of counter-escalation. Russian citizens who share little affinity with Putin or his war today could become patriotic Putinites overnight.

 NPR provides more detail on the law that governs potential attacks on heads of state:

    Assassination during military conflict is specifically forbidden by the Lieber Code, which     President        Abraham Lincoln issued as a general order for U.S. forces in 1863.

   Section IX of the code states that the laws of war forbid declaring a member of a hostile force or a        citizen or subject of a hostile government to be an outlaw "who may be        slain without trial."

"Civilized nations look with horror upon offers of rewards for the assassination of               enemies  relapses into barbarism," according to the Lieber Code, which underpins international conventions on  warfare.

    Graham's remarks drew wide attention and criticism. In response, U.K. Prime Minister Boris                  Johnson's office said he believes Putin should be held responsible for any war crimes committee         citing an investigation by the International Criminal Court.

    The senator's communications director, Kevin Bishop, sought to clarify his comments.   

Graham "also expressed he was okay with a coup to remove Putin as well," Bishop said.   "Basic            point, Putin has to go," he said, adding that the Russian people should find the "off ramp" to the            international crisis.

As for misinterpretation of Graham's remarks, some have suggested he called for Putin's assassination. But that's not quite what he said; he suggested that Putin's demise would be the best way to end war in Ukraine. Even Politico used the phrase "U.S. sponsorship of Putin’s assassination," but I'm not aware that Graham made any hint of U.S. involvement; in fact, he seems to clearly suggest that any such action must come from inside Russia.  

Bottom line: Lindsey Graham is a U.S. senator, and he should realize he was raising a sensitive subject in a time of war. He should give his remarks more thought before he makes them, they should rise above the level of bar-stool chatter, and they probably should come behind closed doors.

To the extent that Graham's main idea was that Putin has to go, he has a point. But he needs to be more careful about how he makes that point.

Perhaps U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) put it best, in a tweet:

    "I really wish our members of Congress would cool it and regulate their remarks as the                             administration works to avoid WWlll. As the world pays attention to how the US and its leaders are      responding, Lindsey's remarks, and remarks made by some House members aren't helpful."

Setting of a criminal-trial date in a case tied to Balch & Bingham proves "You Don't Mess Around with Journalism that Makes a Difference" in public life

Jim Croce

 

The late Jim Croce was one of our all-time favorite pop/folk musicians, and if he were still alive and following corruption in Alabama, he might have written a song that goes something like this (to the tune "You Don't Mess Around With Jim"):

You don't tug on Superman's cape;

You don't spit into the wind;

You don't pull the mask off the ole Lone Ranger;

And you don't mess around with Banbalch.com

Our revised version messes with the meter and rhyming pattern just a bit (OK, a lot). And the last line of this new verse surely would have confused Croce's fans of the day since the Internet was well into the future at the time he was alive, But it helps drive home a point for the purposes of this post: Birmingham-based banbalch.com, which we have come to follow and admire, does serious journalism that has led to an indictment for a one-time client of the Balch & Bingham law firm -- with a criminal-trial date set. And you don't mess around with that kind of reporting, which comes under the banner of the public charity Consejo De Latinos Unidos (CDLU). From  a post by CEO/Publisher K.B. Forbes, under the headline "Update: Motion Denied; Criminal Trial Date Set for Ex-CEO of Balch & Bingham Client":

In 2019, in Balch & Bingham’s 69-page brief before the Alabama Supreme Court in the Newsome Conspiracy Case, the embattled law firm complained that they were not mentioned in the Report by Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III, writing:

BanBalch.com also stated that BanBalch.com/CDLU.org had been in contact with the Office of Special Counsel Robert Mueller about Balch. The now-public Mueller Report, however, does not mention Balch.

Did the foolish leadership at Balch truly believe that we were not in contact with the Office of the Special Counsel because Balch failed at getting an honorable mention in the redacted report? Were these clowns really this stupid?

Perhaps lawyers representing the firm should have considered the matter more fully before writing their brief:

In November of 2020, after three and a half years, our work bore fruit and the ex-CEO of Black Hall Aerospace, Paul Daigle, was indicted for exactly what we wrote to the Honorable Robert S. Mueller III about: possible financial fraud and alleged unqualified personnel.

The indictment shook Balch stooges and defenders who had foolishly dismissed our work with law enforcement.

The shoe dropped loudly, and now a criminal trial date has been set for April 4, 2022, nearly 5 years after we originally briefed Mr. Mueller.

 The lesson? The wheels of justice turn slowly, but hard-nosed journalism can help them lurch ahead in a forward direction:

Judge Abdul K. Kallon, who presided over the North Birmingham Bribery Trial, is presiding over Daigle’s criminal case. In December, Judge Kallon denied Daigle’s Motion to Dismiss the Indictment.

Will Kallon be presiding over additional criminal cases related to Balch & Bingham, Alabama Power, and/or Drummond Coal? The Three Stooges need to be closely investigated and held accountable.

Even if it takes three and a half or five years, inherent goodness shall prevail.

While we're at it, let's enjoy the original version of a Jim Croce classic, which probably ranks up there with "Bad Bad Leroy Brown," and "Time in a Bottle" among his best-known songs:

 

Javelin missiles, the anti-tank weapons that could give underdog Ukraine a fighting chance in war with Putin's Russian army, are assembled in Troy, Alabama

A Javelin missile takes to the air

Javelin anti-tank missiles, the weapons that might give Ukraine a fighting chance in a war with Russia, are made in Alabama. From a report at al.com:

Photographs of weapons being used in the ongoing conflict between Ukraine and Russia put a spotlight on an Alabama manufacturer.

A tweet by Illia Ponomarenko, a defense reporter with the Kyiv Independent, showed a row of Javelin missiles, with the words stamped on the side:

Raytheon/Lockheed Martin

Javelin Joint Venture

Lockheed Martin

Troy, AL 36081

  How effective are the Javelins? Ponomarekno provides a clue:

“I’m afraid we should expect to see hundreds of Russian tanks burning, ladies and gentlemen,” Ponomarenko tweeted.

What about the Alabama connection? Here are details:

The missiles are the product of Lockheed Martin’s Pike County Operations facility in Troy, where about 350 employees manufacture, assemble and test many of the missile programs supported by Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control, including the Javelin. Troy handles assembly.

Billed as “the world’s premier shoulder-fired anti-armor system,” Javelin is a lock-on-before launch shoulder-fired missile with automatic self guidance, which allows a gunner to take cover and reposition immediately after firing, to avoid counterfire. It can also be fired from inside buildings and bunkers, and employed against armored vehicles and buildings, among other targets.

Russia's Putin appears cornered and "addled," but that makes him more unpredictable and dangerous as the West seeks peaceful resolution to war in Ukraine

A Russian convoy

The Russia-Ukraine conflict might be at its most perilous moment, and a key word in the puzzle is "de-escalation" -- and how to achieve it without accidentally prodding Vladimir Putin to take more destructive acts than he's already taken. From a report at Axios, under the headline "Biden's dilemma: How to give Putin an off-ramp":

With Ukraine holding Russia off longer than many U.S. officials had expected, President Biden now faces a great unanswered question — how to give Vladimir Putin an off-ramp to avoid even greater calamity.

A cornered, humiliated Putin could unleash untold pain on the world, from cyberattacks to nuclear threats. After enacting brutal sanctions, the White House now must consider how the invasion can end without a new catastrophe.

Nobody knows what Putin would accept.

Many officials fear that we are heading into a very dangerous period — the punishing Western sanctions pushing an autocrat into a corner.

At least one U.S. official has questioned Putin's mental and emotional stability, and that could be a major wild card in the effort to seek peace:

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), vice chair of the Senate intelligence committee, has hinted Putin could be addled.

"This is the most dangerous moment in 60 years," Rubio tweeted Sunday night. Putin, he said, "is facing a humiliating military fiasco & he has triggered extraordinary consequences on #Russia's economy & people that will not be easy to reverse ... And his only options to reset this imbalance are catastrophic ones."

A European diplomat told reporters at a briefing yesterday: "It's like the Sun Tzu thing of giving someone a golden bridge to retreat across. How do you get him to go in a different direction?"

"I think the door to diplomacy remains open," the diplomat continued. "Putin ... doesn't normally back down. But he also controls the information environment in his own country to such an extent that if he does, he can cover his tracks. ... So I think there is room for him to de-escalate — and that's certainly what we're pressing for."

The diplomat pointed to [Sunday's] Russia-Ukraine peace talks in Belarus as the most viable off-ramp in a sea of bad options, noting that negotiations lasted for four hours and appear headed for a second round.

No one seems to know what might be possible with Putin: 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said before the talks that he was willing to discuss "neutral status" for Ukraine — one of Putin's three demands.

But the other two — demilitarization and "denazification" of Ukraine, and recognition of Russia's claim to Crimea — suggest Putin will never accept a deal in which Zelensky remains in power.

The bottom line: The West's response to Putin — for so long, uncertain and halting — has moved at astonishing speed and ferocity over the past week. How Putin will respond — and whether de-escalation is even possible — is keeping national-security leaders up at night.

Ali Alexander, the right-wing extremist with Alabama ties, makes cryptic comments that suggest he might be playing a dangerous game with the Jan. 6 committee

Ali Alexander

 

Alabama-connected extremist Ali Alexander has a history of making inflammatory statements, some of which suggest he might be willing to test the boundaries of law to advance a right-wing agenda. One example came when he led a "victory or death" chant the night before the Jan. 6 mob assault on the U.S. Capitol. The latest example comes via a Media Matters report in which Alexander claims he is working behind the scenes to disrupt the committee investigating Jan. 6.

That raises at least two questions: (1) What tools does Alexander have at his disposal to disrupt a Congressional committee? (2) Is Alexander referring to a potential crime, such as obstruction of justice or the related obstruction of Congress?

Come to think of it, that raises two additional questions: (3) Does Alexander realize he could be talking about activity that amounts to a crime? (4) Why haven't his lawyers told him to keep his mouth shut after testifying before the committee on Dec. 9?

The Media Matters story is built around an online stream in which Alexander appears to reference an interview he did with Tucker Carlson of Fox News:

ALI ALEXANDER (“STOP THE STEAL” ORGANIZER): But something I wanted to say was if you watched that interview, you probably know more -- I'm not kidding -- than 95 percent of the public about the January 6 select committee process. And I'll tell you why it is. It's because most of the liberal media is actually not well-sourced on the issue, which is interesting. And then there are a couple of journalists who are on the left who are well-sourced on the issue, and they're dumping and leaking information that's being illegally leaked from the committee. And, and then on the right, it's not really being covered, which, don't worry, that will fix itself. I've got -- I -- like I said, Ali's hard at work. It's a full-time job right now, but it will pay off for the whole country. There's few things that I've been -- there are few things that I've done in my life that immediately help the country. And what I've been doing for the past four weeks behind the scenes is going to help over 100 million people. 

And so I'm really proud of that. And including a lawsuit with Nancy Pelosi, but again, it's just like the birth of "Stop the Steal." No one understands the crazy connections that I see. You can just either believe me or not, you know? And then everyone sees it. And then the left decides it's a threat. So the fortunate thing is I'm so underestimated by the left, and what I am doing behind the scenes will impact all of America, but it will positively impact at least the 75 million of us that voted for Trump.

Alexander might believe he's being clever or uncharacteristically coy, and in fact, his words might prove to be harmless enough. But there is this little matter called "obstruction of Congress," and Alexander's words suggest he, or someone on his behalf, might be traipsing close to a slippery legal boundary. 

Obstruction of Congress is a complex topic, and it can come in a variety of forms. One of the better definitions we've found comes under 18 U.S.C. 1505, which reads in part:

Whoever corruptly, or by threats or force, or by any threatening letter or communication influences, obstructs, or impedes or endeavors to influence, obstruct, or impede the due and proper administration of the law under which any pending proceeding is being had before any department or agency of the United States, or the due and proper exercise of the power of inquiry under which any inquiry or investigation is being had by either House, or any committee of either House or any joint committee of the Congress—

Shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 5 years or, if the offense involves international or domestic terrorism (as defined in section 2331), imprisoned not more than 8 years, or both.

We are not sure where Alexander thinks he's headed with his behind-the-scenes work, but the words of Sec. 1505 suggest he should tread softly. 

The language of 1505 suggests fooling around with the work of a Congressional committee might make for entertaining social-media banter, but it probably is not a smart move. If Alexander himself does not understand that, his lawyers -- who probably aren't working for free -- would be wise to make sure he does. 

No-knock warrant that led to the fatal shooting of Amir Locke in Minnesota is a glaring sign that police reform must move out of the shadows onto the front burner

With Russia invading Ukraine and the Trump family facing investigations from all directions, the issue of police reform seems to have gotten lost in the battle for Americans' attention. The recent fatal shooting of Amir Locke in Minnesota is a sign that police reform cannot wait any longer, according to an op-ed piece at CNN. 

Arick Wierson, a six-time Emmy Award-winning television producer and former media adviser to New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, says now is the time for police reform to take a front-row seat in the American conscience. Writes Wierson:

The killing of 22-year-old Amir Locke earlier this month at the hands of a SWAT team officer from the Minneapolis Police Department has once again made the city the focal point of the ongoing national conversation around race and policing.

The 14-second video released by city officials shows how a Minneapolis SWAT unit, acting on a no-knock search warrant in a homicide investigation, stormed into the apartment where Locke was apparently asleep. He was then seen holding a gun when he woke up, just seconds before he was shot and killed. Police said Locke wasn't named in any search warrants and attorneys for Locke's family said he was in legal possession of his firearm.

 

Nevertheless, the bottom line is this: in a city still reeling from the impact of the murder of George Floyd in May 2020, yet again, an innocent Black life has been needlessly extinguished at the hands of Minneapolis law enforcement.

Could a fairly straightforward type of police reform have prevented Amir Locke's death? Wierson suggests the answer is yes:

The circumstances that led to Locke's death -- namely the issuance of a no-knock search warrant, a practice that disproportionately affects African Americans across the country -- might have been avoided if the elected officials from both parties in Washington had taken police reform more seriously. Despite calls for change, federal lawmakers have failed to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act not once, but twice. While it would have banned only no-knock warrants in drug cases, the legislation would have been a significant first step towards police reform.

But, here we are again. In 2022, less than three years since an errant no-knock warrant led to the death of Breonna Taylor in Kentucky and not even two years since the murder of George Floyd, another Black man has unnecessarily been robbed of his future at the hands of law enforcement, simply for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

 

I live in the Minneapolis area and, as I wrote in the aftermath of the Floyd murder, the entire episode served as a rude awakening for me and countless other White Americans to the daily challenges confronted by people of color, especially African Americans, when it comes to interactions with law enforcement. I had hoped that after so many Black lives were lost to bad policing -- Breonna Taylor, Tamir Rice, Eric Garner, Daunte Wright and Philando Castile, who have become posthumous household names in recent years -- something would have been done by federal lawmakers to clean up, create national standards, outline best-practices and ultimately save lives.

Congress has seen an effort to launch police reform, but it stalled and has not been able to regain traction. Writes Wierson:

In June of 2020, less than a month after the Floyd murder, Democrats in both houses of Congress introduced a watershed bill which passed the House but didn't make it through the then-Republican-controlled Senate. GOP lawmakers instead proposed a defanged version of the bill that Democrats blocked. Then, in 2021, the legislation, by then known as the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, was reintroduced and passed the House again.

As the public uproar around the Black Lives Matter receded and concerns about the Covid-19 Delta variant spread, political support on the Hill for taking up the legislation slowly withered. The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act aimed to set up a national registry of police misconduct, ban racial and religious profiling by law enforcement at the federal, state and local levels, and overhaul qualified immunity, which protects law enforcement from accountability. 

At the moment, even mild police reform appears to be a victim of partisan politics. Wierson says that needs to change:

Even South Carolina's lone Black GOP Sen. Tim Scott, who had joined with Democrats in working on the legislation, was unable to find at least nine fellow Republicans willing to go along with him to reach the 60-vote mark that the legislation required to overcome the filibuster rule in the chamber. Moreover, without the support of Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona to scrap the antiquated filibuster rule so that the measure could pass by simple majority, there was simply no way to get the bill to President Joe Biden's desk to become law. Scott eventually even turned against his own bill.

What might police reform look like under the George Floyd Act?

Among its most salient provisions, the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act explicitly banned no-knock warrants for federal narcotics investigations and it wielded a fairly big stick over state and local law enforcement agencies by threatening to hold back federal dollars for those that refused to follow suit. And although many jurisdictions either cut back or altogether eliminated the use of no-knock warrants in the two years since the death of Breonna Taylor, Minneapolis was not one of them.

 

In fact, as the Minneapolis Star Tribune uncovered, since the start of the new year, Minneapolis police department officials had filed for and secured at least 13 applications for no-knock warrants -- one more than the 12 standard search warrants that they obtained during that same time frame.

 

Although the no-knock warrant that lead to Locke's shooting was not part of a drug-related investigation as would be stipulated in the bill, the mere threat of pulling federal dollars from local police budgets would have pointed a spotlight on the entire practice of no-knock warrants, likely helping diminish such frequent use of these highly aggressive tactics. Perhaps it wouldn't have taken Locke's death to get to where Minneapolis is now after its mayor, Jacob Frey, declared a moratorium on the practice altogether pending further study following Locke's death.

What's next for police reform? That remains unclear, but faint-hearted politicians likely will remain a roadblock. Wierson explains:

For all the impassioned speeches about the senseless deaths of Floyd, Taylor and so many other Black Americans at the hands of law enforcement, federal lawmakers have done absolutely nothing to prevent the cycle from repeating itself -- something the world witnessed once again with the death of Amir Locke.

 

And sadly, without meaningful action in Washington, it's bound to happen again.

Birmingham media outlets take strangely contrary positions on Balch & Bingham law firm as redistricting sparks racial tensions in cities across Alabama

Birmingham's Balch & Bingham law firm cannot seem to outrun its history of taking dubious actions on matters of race. Balch, however is at the heart of wildly incongruent reporting in the Alabama press.

How dumbfounding has the Balch-related reporting been of late? On one hand, al.com produced a serious and thoughtful article on Alabama's struggles with redistricting, noting Balch's role in producing maps that appear to dilute black voting power. On the other hand, Birmingham Business Journal -- get this -- named Balch a leader in its Diversity and Inclusion Awards. Huh?

K.B. Forbes, publisher of banbalch.com, examines both articles and notes the peculiar status Balch seems to hold in some parts of the Birmingham community. Writes Forbes, under the headline "Balch’s Questionable Advisors and Birmingham Business Journal’s Worthless and Make-Believe Awards":

In a lengthy and insightful article about electoral redistricting in the state of Alabama, the AL.com headline screamed, “‘Don’t take us back to Jim Crow’: Redistricting sparks passion, racial tensions in Alabama cities.”

AL.com writes:

“In Auburn, they are trying to compact all of the African Americans into one district where they could have had two districts that are predominately African American,” said Bernard Simelton, president of the Alabama NAACP.

Auburn city officials said they did not receive enough analysis to back the idea of the city having two majority-minority districts.

Critics say the advisors Auburn utilized to determine its map analysis were questionable. The efforts in Auburn were led by Balch and Bingham attorney, Dorman Walker, who defended Alabama’s congressional map in federal court.

Decades ago, racists would burn crosses to terrorize and intimidate minorities. Today, alleged racists use redistricting to intimidate and, “dilute and divide” minority voters.

Forbes then tackles the Birmingham Business Journal article, and you can almost hear his eyes rolling:

Last week, in a move that looks like heavily-paid-for-public-relations-fluff, the Birmingham Business Journal (BBJ) ridiculously named Balch & Bingham a leader in diversity in BBJ’s 2022 Diversity & Inclusion Awards, and named as an honoree Balch’s Managing Partner Stan Blanton.

For a law firm in which only 2 percent of their partners are people of color, where a criminal bribery scandal that targeted poor African-American children was born, and where only 11 people of color are attorneys or part of management (exactly one per office), the meritless public relations award is indeed the figment of a spin doctor’s imagination.

Frankly and vulgarly, BBJ gave Balch a BJ. The pleasure was momentary, but the price was abominable.

BBJ Publisher Joel Welker and Editor-in-Chief Stephanie Rebman join the list of Balch stooges who appear to sell their souls or amputate their brains for 30 pieces of silver or less.

More than a swollen black eye, BBJ (like Balch) has burned their reputation.

Stan Blanton, who has refused to apologize to the African-American community in North Birmingham for the criminal misconduct of ex-Balch partner Joel I. Gilbert, is probably relishing in this worthless and make-believe “honor.”

But the public isn’t buying the fabricated, pat-me-on-the-back bullshit.

The tweet announcing Blanton as a honoree received only one anonymous like and no shares or retweets.

Pathetic! Ridiculously pathetic!

Republicans Cruz, Hawley, and Cotton suggest that Biden's nominee for judicial post has contributed to crime problem by correcting wrongful convictions

Nina Morrison

 

A confirmation hearing for one of President Biden's judicial nominees provided evidence that at least three U.S. senators, all Republicans, have little clue about how the U.S. criminal-justice system works. Senators Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Josh Hawley (R-Missouri), and Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas) posed questions to nominee Nina Morrison that one journalist described as embarrassing.

What had the GOP trio worked up? It was Morrison's history of working with the Innocence Project, where she reportedly helped free more than 30 innocent people from prison and death row. Never mind that most third graders probably are familiar with the concept that an accused "is innocent until proven guilty in a court of law." In Morrison's case, she helped obtain justice for people who were innocent all along, even after being wrongly convicted. Writes HuffPost's Jennifer Bendery under the headline "Republicans Blame Crime On An Innocence Project Lawyer Tapped For A Judgeship; GOP senators accused Biden's court pick Nina Morrison, who has freed dozens of innocent people from prison, of fueling violent crimes. Huh?

In a hearing . . .  that was as performative as it was embarrassingly ill-informed, Senate Republicans tried to blame one of President Joe Biden’s judicial nominees — Nina Morrison, an attorney with the Innocence Project who has freed dozens of innocent people from prison — for driving up violent crime across America.

Morrison, 52, is up for a lifetime seat on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District Of New York. She is the senior litigation counsel at the New York-based Innocence Project, an organization focused on exonerating wrongly convicted people through DNA testing and reforming the criminal justice system to prevent future injustice.

She has been lead or co-counsel on cases that have freed more than 30 innocent people from prison and death row.

But Republicans in the Judiciary Committee went after Morrison as if she had committed the crimes that her clients were convicted of — that they didn’t actually commit, either. They tried to blame her for recent spikes in violent crimes in cities, and pressed her on whether she felt guilty about freeing people from prison who had been convicted of violent crimes, glossing over the fact that they had been exonerated by DNA evidence.

“The whole of your record is deeply disturbing,” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) told Morrison.

“Across this country, Americans are horrified at skyrocketing crime rates, at skyrocketing homicide rates, at skyrocketing burglary rates, at skyrocketing carjacking rates,” he said. “All of those are the direct result of the policies you’ve spent your entire lifetime advancing.”

Hawley went even further, suggesting wrongful convictions are just part of a U.S. system based on "the rule of law:

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) told Morrison he planned to oppose her nomination, along with any other nominees the Biden administration puts forward who are “soft on crime.”

“I will oppose you and anyone else the administration sends to us who do not understand the necessity of the rule of law,” he said.

None of it made sense until you noticed a pattern in the attacks Republicans were making: First, use a judicial nomination to wage a proxy fight against progressive prosecutors, a cohort of left-leaning Democratic district attorneys who have sought reforms to the bail system, curbed enforcement of lower-level marijuana offenses and increased the use of diversion programs over jail time. Second, falsely cast these Democratic district attorneys’ policies as the reason for spikes in crime, and then tie the judicial nominee to those policies and therefore the violence.

After Cruz and Hawley sprayed brain flatulence in all directions, Cotton joined in. From a report at Salon:

Cotton, notorious for his call to set the military on George Floyd protesters, also threw out fighting words during the hearing.

"Are you proud that you encouraged such defiance in convicted murderers?" the Republican senator asked Morrison, whose work has led to the exonerations of at least 30 people who were wrongfully convicted. In one exchange, Cotton challenged Morrison over the execution of Ledell Lee, an Arkansas man who was convicted for the murder of his neighbor in 1993. Back in 2017, Morrison casted strong doubt over Lee's prosecution, which she said overlooked "significant" DNA evidence suggesting that Lee was innocent.

HuffPost's Bendery probably was on target when she wrote . . . 

The whole situation — the faux outrage, the claims that Morrison was soft on crime, the claims that Republicans were the ones who were tough on crime — was a ridiculous spectacle, given that Morrison has spent her entire career getting innocent people out of prison. 

The GOP attacks perhaps offer a preview of how Republicans on the panel plan to go after Biden’s Supreme Court nominee when she comes before the committee

SCOTUS allows North Birmingham bribery convictions to stand, but signs point to a renewed investigation, sniffing around some of Alabama's deepest pockets

Mike Cole, Jay Town, Mark Crosswhite

The U.S. Supreme Court yesterday denied certiorari, allowing convictions in the North Birmingham Superfund scandal to stand. The action answers a few questions, but it raises a number of others, reports banbalch.com. Writes Publisher K.B. Forbes, under the headline "Righteous or Corrupt Verdict? SCOTUS Allows Convictions to Stand; More Indictments Coming?":

Today, the Supreme Court of the United States denied a petition for a Writ of Certiorari for ex-Balch & Bingham partner Joel I. Gilbert. The same goes for ex-Drummond executive David Roberson.

Gilbert is serving 5 years in federal prison while Roberson is serving 30 months.

Now that the crimes in the North Birmingham Bribery Scandal have been affirmed and all legal appeals have been exhausted, are more criminal indictments coming?

Forbes notes a curious comment that Assistant U.S. Attorney George Martin, lead prosecutor on the case, made after the convictions came down:

After their criminal convictions, Assistant U.S. Attorney George Martin, the lead prosecutor of the North Birmingham Bribery Case stated:

We’re happy for the citizens of Birmingham that someone is finally speaking on their behalf. We’re happy that we were able to shine a light into this dark corner of Alabama politics and clean up a little bit of the pollution that’s there. This jury has spoken valiantly that this won’t be tolerated … . This is a righteous verdict.

A little bit of the pollution?

Was Martin foreshadowing what was to come?

Martin, who transferred to Mobile after the case, was allegedly disgusted with the politics in the Birmingham Office of the U.S. Attorney of the Northern District of Alabama run by then-U.S Attorney Jay E. Town who at the time foolishly closed the hope for additional probes claiming that Gilbert and Roberson were “lone wolves” in the scandal, which many in media and law enforcement thought was pure bullshit. 

A year and three months later, jaw-dropping photos of Alabama Power CEO and ex-Balch partner Mark A. Crosswhite enjoying refreshing cocktails with U.S. Attorney Jay E. Town allegedly at the height of the criminal trial rocked the political and business establishment.

Now insiders hint that Balch, Alabama Power, Drummond, Matrix, and other Balch stooges are allegedly being investigated for possible Obstruction of Justice.

And it makes perfect sense.

The convictions might remain in place, but Forbes sees signs that the scandal is far from over:

In the summer of 2019, we met with top investigators, some working for the U.S. Department of Justice, while on a trip in Washington. As we wrote then:

While Balch & Bingham, Drummond, and their alleged corrupt allies …may be contemplating more acts of gross injustice, eagle eyes are watching and bat ears are listening to every move, every exchange, every motion.

Our contacts at DOJ told us at the time that because of their deep pockets, Alabama Power not Balch & Bingham was the problem. What gravely concerned them was the incestuous corruption in Jefferson County.

The enormous amount of politcal pressure placed by Balch boosters and allies not to indict in 2017 in the North Birmingham Bribery Scandal was unprecedented, and to some seasoned DOJ investigators, indicative of Alabama Power’s alleged deep financial pockets and alleged unchecked power.

Last year we saw similar political pressure when Alabama Power, Balch, and Drummond filed protective orders and had Roberson ‘s $75 million civil case sealed in its entirety.

The rebirth of the North Birmingham Bribery Trial caused uncontrolled panic.

Where might investigators turn? Forbes provides a number of clues:

Now a criminal investigation could open the doors wide-open at Alabama Power, exposing Crosswhite in the nude (figuratively). Investigators can then drag themselves through the raw sewage of Sloppy Joe and the Matrix Meltdown. Finally, law enforcement can hold Drummond’s “confused” General Counsel accountable and interview every member of the Drummond family.

Jay E. Town and convicted ex-State Representative Oliver Robinson will make excellent witnesses to interview and so will Mike Cole, the third man in the jaw-dropping photographs.

As we wrote two weeks ago, there is a long cast of alleged suspects and stooges, and a lengthy list of alleged criminal acts that need to be probed.

The probe won’t happen overnight and appears to have begun in late October.

The Biden Administration appears to be quietly moving ahead. The DOJ, the EPA, and the SEC each have chips in this game.

And as a final note, besides Assistant U.S. Attorney Martin transferring to Mobile, we learned that two top FBI agents involved with the North Birmingham investigation were promoted away from the corrupt cesspool of Jefferson County.

Obviously law enforcement professionals have had enough of the corrupt shenanigans in the Magic City.

But then again, who has the deep pockets to fund these corrupt shenanigans?