BBC News: A father and son were arrested in northern Italy on suspicion of providing logistical and material support to the Mumbai terrorists.
“They are accused of supplying cash from their money transfer agency to pay for an internet phone account used by people in contact with the attackers” who killed upwards of 170 people a year ago.
Just heard on KFI AM 640: the Los Angeles Police Department will soon join the ranks of law enforcement agencies using Next-Generation 911 (Next Gen 911 or NG 911) systems. Here’s an example of Florida County implementing NG911.
According to KFI, people in Los Angeles will soon be able to call 911 and if appropriate the LAPD will direct them to send images, texts, and video to the LAPD CAD (computer-aided dispatch) system. CAD can then send the information to patrol units to assist in their law enforcement efforts.
Hey, maybe they can transmit it to other agencies as well (hint, hint)!
Kudos to the LAPD for integrating available Web 2.0 and communications technologies into CAD operations and maximizing the increasing potential to fight crime.
Al Jazeera: Shortly after midnight, drone missiles hit a compound commonly used by anti-government and al-Qaeda-linked fighters in Palooseen, North Waziristan. Eight were killed. In its report, Al Jazeera labeled them as “US drones” but cited no evidence to back up their claim.
The attack, shortly after midnight, occurred while Leon Panetta was in Islamabad meeting with officials and “hours after a suicide bomber blew himself up outside a court building in the city, killing at least 19 people.”
Al Jazeera: A suicide bomb outside the gates of a judicial complex in Peshawar, Pakistan has left 19 dead and 30 injured. The bombing occurred during rush hour, guaranteeing that plenty of lawyers, court personnel, and visitors would be present.
“The blast comes as military battles members of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, one of the main anti-government groups, in the country’s semi-autonomous tribal region of South Waziristan.”
Guardian UK: “Mexico’s attorney general and other senior staff have had computer chips implanted in their arms to serve both as an identity device and a tracking mechanism should they be kidnapped…The primary function of the chip…was to control access to the centre in order to reduce the risk of sensitive information being leaked to criminal gangs.”
Rhetorican and STRATFOR: Can anyone make sense of the Khalid Sheikh Mohammed trial?
Drudge: Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who is widely believed to head the Sinaloa Cartel, is ranked number 41 on the Forbes list of “Most Powerful People.” He is ranked ahead of Dmitry Medvedev, Benjamin Netanyahu, Nicolas Sarkozy, and Hugo Chavez.
According to Forbes, Guzman “is believed to have shipped $6 billion to $19 billion in cocaine to the United States over the past eight years…”
Al Jazeera reports that pirates have freed a Spanish ship hijacked six weeks ago in the Indian ocean, allegedly in exchange for 3.5 million dollars.
On a somewhat related note: interesting perspective from the Nigerian News Service on why nations should not negotiate with hijackers and kidnappers.
…from the Emergency Email and Wireless Network. Notifications of natural disasters or other emergencies come from local, regional and national government sources.
The latest raid in Riverside, CA on members of the La Familia drug cartel has resulted in the seizure of $3.4 million dollars, 730 pounds of meth, and more than 400 weapons from members of the organization.
As part of Project Coronado, dozens of raids like these have been conducted over the last couple of days in 19 states and have “involved more than 3,000 federal agents and police officers… resulting in the arrests of more than 300 people.”
Click here for more on this story.
BBC News reports that French authorities have arrested a French nuclear physicist of Algerian descent on charges of “criminal association with a terrorist enterprise.”
He was workng at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (Cern), “Europe’s main centre for the study of atomic physics…at the Cern laboratory which houses the giant Large Hadron Collider.”
Authorities have been quick to emphasize that his work “did not bring him into contact with anything that could be used for terrorism.”
Officials noted that he had not been at work for most of the year, claiming illness, but he was in contact via email.
[J]udicial sources told the AFP news agency that agents had come across him during a separate inquiry into the recruitment of would-be Islamist militants who wanted to fight in Afghanistan.The physicist had exchanged messages over the internet with people known to be close to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb [AQiLIM] and expressed a desire to carry out attacks, but had “not got to the stage of carrying out material acts of preparation”, one said.
For more on al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb [AQiLIM] click here.
John Avlon, former chief speechwriter for Rudy Giuliani, poses this question in his CNN article about the increasing presence and impact of political fringe extremists in this culture.
This point is particularly prescient in an age where certain pro-Islamists seek to foster divisiveness in America. So much for “United We Stand.”
And in what I call entertainment news, ABC reports that Allen Stanford, the former Texas billionaire of the infamous Stanford financial group incarcerated for perpetrating fraud amounting to a “massive Ponzi scheme,” was hospitalized after a jail fight with another inmate in the private detention facility north of Houston where he is serving time. His injuries reportedly were non life-threatening. I’m sure many of Stanford’s victims are singing the praises of the guy who gave him a beat down.
Update: NYDaily News on how Bernie Madoff is doing…
Stanford (right) used to stock "Brilliant Brunette" shampoo in his office bathroom. Moral: never take the claims of your shampoo too seriously.
CBS and NYDailyNews.com report that as part of a joint terror task force investigation, the FBI and NYPD raided homes in Queens, NY amid terror threats and pursuant to a search warrant. One of the homes belonged to an Assad Niazi, a self-employed antiques dealer, who insisted that he was not the target of the search but “has roommates that may have been targeted.”
“The raids came after an individual under surveillance for alleged links to al-Qaida came to New York City over the weekend and left the area, Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., said.”
Silicon Valley start-up Palantir makes news with the WSJ (click to view video) as it contracts with the CIA and other agencies. Recently their data analysis software was used to expose a network of suicide bombers.
H/T: Rhetorican.com
…the new TLC show focusing on female members of the force and ” the more confrontational perks of police work.”
Click here for an article critiquing the reality series.
Police are set to review (note they didn’t say reopen) the “cold case” of Stones guitarist Brian Jones’s death after “the emergence of new evidence.”
In 1969, Jones was deemed to have died “by misadventure” when his body was found at the bottom of a private swimming pool on a farm/estate in East Sussex, U.K.
Click here for NME article.
H/T: Rhetorican.com for the excellent heads up as always
The Washington Post article details how Khalid Sheikh Mohammed gave “terrorist tutorials” to intelligence officers and even occasionally used a blackboard and scolded any officers with poor note-taking abilities.
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