Save the Peaks!

Greetings,

Here are some articles on the current struggle to protect the Holy San Francisco Peaks.Flagstaff City council will vote whether or not to amend their current snowmaking contract with Arizona Snowbowl on Monday, August 30th at 5:30 PM at Sinagua High School in Flagstaff, AZ. The amendment includes using Flagstaff's drinking water instead of wastewater. An option that every tribe in Arizona is now opposed to (The Inter-tribal Tribal Council of Arizona just made a statement affirming opposition to the plan).

As Snowbowl threatens to start cutting trees as early as next week, we need your support more than ever.

We will be holding a rally and prayer vigil at 4:00 PM at Foxglenn park (near Sinagua at 4200 E. Butler Ave) before the council meeting.

If you cannot join us please send an email & make phone calls to Flagstaff City Council:To email all: council@flagstaffaz.govPhone: (928) 779-7600

You can also sign the "Water is Life" petition: http://www.petitiononline.com/sc083010/petition.html

For more information: www.truesnow.org or www.savethepeaks.org.

Wall Street Journal: Fake Snow a Real Sore Point as Indians Battle Ski Resort

Tribes Find Phony Flakes Disrespectful; 'Like Bombing a Church'

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703908704575433852972813596.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_editorsPicks_3 By MIRIAM JORDANFLAGSTAFF, Ariz.—When rain recently deluged northern Arizona, many Hopi tribe members interpreted it as an omen: Mother Nature was unhappy about a ski resort's plans to spray man-made snow on peaks sacred to the Native Americans. "When you interfere with Mother Nature," says Hopi tribe Vice Chairman Herman Honanie, gazing at the 12,000-foot-high San Francisco Peaks, "Mother Nature has a response."If so, she's not the only one. Tribal elders, U.S. senators, federal judges and senior Obama Administration officials all have weighed in on this spat over land where the Hopi, Navajo and 11 other tribes trace their origins.The Native Americans believe it is sacrilege for skiers and snowboarders to cruise the slopes. The Arizona Snowbowl resort says it's just trying to run a business, not trample on tribal religious rights. The Native Americans have been battling the resort since the 1970s. For the second time in 20 years, the U.S. Supreme Court last year refused to hear their case, and now the war of attrition is coming to a head at the Flagstaff City Council. Local officials are to vote on whether to pump potable recycled water to the resort to make snow. It's unclear whether this will appease the tribes, who were infuriated by a previous plan to use treated sewer water. Some believe man-made snow disrespects the natural process of precipitation. "This mountain is where life began; it created us," says Rex Tilousi, a leader of the Havasupai tribe. Native Americans journey to the peaks to collect herbs for traditional healing and worship deities they believe dwell there. Dumping artificial snow there, says Mr. Tilousi, is "like bombing a church." For the operators of Snowbowl, artificial snow is a hedge against unpredictable weather, a lifeline for hundreds of mainly seasonal jobs."If you don't have snowmaking, the question is not if you will go out of business; it's when you will go out of business," says Eric Borowsky, the resort's owner. "We only occupy 1% of the peaks. Can't we share this?" Snowbowl sits on 777 acres in the Coconino National Forest. Mr. Borowsky and his partners bought the resort in 1992, betting on its appeal to residents of the Phoenix area, a two-hour drive away. "We thought it would be an easy business," he says. But in 2001-02, a bare winter limited the ski season to four days and 2,857 skiers. The resort drafted a plan to expand and produce artificial snow from treated waste water.After years of environmental review detailed in a 600-page report, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Forest Service, which oversees the federal land that the resort sits on, approved the plan in 2005. The city of Flagstaff would sell the resort a maximum 1.5 million gallons a day of "class A-plus reclaimed water" during ski season, according to court transcripts. "There was no demand for that water in the winter from golf courses, parks and schools," says City Manager Kevin Burke. "We were just throwing it away, anyway."Tribal leaders were incensed. Snow made from water that had flowed through morgues, hospitals and kitchen sinks was tantamount to cultural "genocide," said Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley Jr. Leigh J. Kuwanwisiwma, the Hopi cultural preservation director, called it a "dagger in the Hopis' spirituality." Backed by environmental groups, including the Sierra Club, the tribes sued the Forest Service to halt the resort's project. Soon, this city of 63,000 was buried in a snow saga. After speaking in favor of using recycled water to make snow, then-Mayor Joseph Donaldson found his car adorned with toilet paper and a urine-filled commode. In March 2007, a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling barred Snowbowl's expansion. Judge William Fletcher wrote that "from time immemorial" the tribes have counted on the purity of the peaks' water for religious practices. Allowing treated sewage on the peaks would be as "if the government were to require that baptisms be carried out with reclaimed water," he wrote. But the following year, the same court reversed the decision. Reclaimed wastewater for snowmaking didn't "substantially burden" the tribes' exercise of religion, it ruled.In June 2009, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case, effectively clearing the last legal obstacle to Snowbowl's expansion plans. Yet Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack directed the Forest Service to hold off issuing a construction permit, in hopes of achieving a compromise. The tribes' green allies opened a new legal front. They filed a lawsuit in federal court alleging that snow made of treated effluent posed health risks if ingested. Remnants of "personal-care products and pharmaceuticals is what you find in reclaimed sewer water," said their attorney, Howard Shanker, in an interview at a Flagstaff coffee shop with a view of the peaks. Flagstaff city officials, meanwhile, suggested switching the source for fake snow from "reclaimed" water to "recovered, reclaimed" water, that is potable. The difference: an underground filtration process that allows for natural earth cleansing. "Pushing water through dirt and rocks makes it come out cleaner on the other side," says Mr. Burke. The potable water is pricier.Agriculture Secretary Vilsack liked the better-water idea and pledged federal funding to cover the extra cost. City officials say that supplying potable water to the peaks could cost an additional $11 million over 20 years. Arizona's senators were incensed. Republicans John McCain and Jon Kyl sent Secretary Vilsack a letter in March condemning "the use of taxpayer dollars to subsidize snowmaking at Arizona Snowbowl." At the same time, they called on the government to grant Snowbowl permission to start its expansion "immediately." The new water plan initially threw some tribal leaders off balance. Hopi water officials informed Secretary Vilsack in a letter that fake snow from potable water was an "imperfect" but acceptable solution. Hopi Chairman LeRoy N. Shingoitewa then fired off a separate letter, saying the officials had acted without authority. Vice Chairman Honanie reiterated the tribe's opposition to snowmaking of any kind at a public meeting in Flagstaff on July 29.Flagstaff's seven city council members are scheduled to vote Aug. 30 whether to sell potable water to the resort. Mr. Burke, the city manager, sums up the situation as "muddy water at this point." Write to Miriam Jordan at miriam.jordan@wsj.com

###Navajo Times: Hikers side with tribes in Peaks issuehttp://www.navajotimes.com/news/2010/0810/082710peaks.php

By Cindy Yurth
Tséyi' Bureau DOOKO'OSLÍÍD, Ariz., Aug. 27, 2010

he Navajo and Hopi tribes have both come out against the latest proposal for snowmaking on the San Francisco Peaks - using potable rather than reclaimed sewage water - but how do Flagstaff locals feel about the issue? To find out, the Navajo Times interviewed people taking the sky ride (the summer name for the Arizona Snow Bowl's chairlift) and hiking the network of trails around Mt. Humphreys on Aug. 20.By a margin of five to one in an admittedly limited and unscientific poll, people actually using the mountain thought that any kind of snowmaking on the mountain is probably a bad idea - even people who had not heard of the tribes' objections. One man declined to take a stand because he was not familiar with the issue. The decision will be up to the Flagstaff City Council at a specially scheduled meeting Monday."I'm not really for it (snowmaking)," said Zachary Thomason, 28, who had just headed down from the summit. "It hasn't been done before, so we don't know what it's going to do to the vegetation and the habitat. It's not just about making money off the mountain. You have to think about our heritage, and what we're all here for." Asked if he knew the mountain was sacred to 13 regional tribes, Thomason said he did, and added there are plenty of non-Indians who also revere the mountain in their own way."Everybody should be pulling together on this one," he said. Stephen Dacosta, 25, a graduate student who had just moved to Flagstaff from Tennessee, said he didn't know about the mountain's special place in tribal spirituality, but thought it seemed wasteful to import water from the city for snowmaking. "In an area that has a shortage of water, it seems like a no-brainer," he said.As might be expected, two 16-year-old Navajos hiking on Dooko'oslííd opposed the proposal."The mountain is sacred to us. They shouldn't disturb it," said Chadwick Sutter. "They should respect other people's religious beliefs," echoed Mike Parra.

Tony Randall, 52, of Flagstaff agreed."This is a shrine," he said. "Whether we agree with it or not, we have to respect it." Randall and his wife have gone as far as to boycott the SnowBowl - a tough decision for lifelong skiers who actually chose their house for its proximity to the ski area."I'm sure the resort isn't worried about a one-couple boycott," Randall said. "But it makes us feel better." Jan and Jeff Laufhutte of Hillsdale, N.J., regularly vacation in Flagstaff to take advantage of the outdoor recreation and are considering moving here. They weren't familiar with the SnowBowl issue, but Jan, 47, said she believes in respecting Native beliefs. "We don't want to trample on their rights, that for sure," she said, adding, "I just hope it works out to everybody's benefit."Jeff, 49, was a little more cautious. "I'd have to study the issue," he said. "This is a different world from where we're from. We have plenty of water." The only pro-snowmaking voice came from Ken Von Schulze, a 55-year-old Flagstaff resident who was just coming from the sky ride."I think it's good for the economy," he said. "If you look at a map, you can see that it's just a small portion, a minor amount of area that is used for the ski area."

-- Klee Benallyindigenousaction@gmail.com

www.indigenousaction.org - Independent Indigenous Media www.oybm.org - Indigenous Youth Empowerment! www.savethepeaks.org - Protect Sacred Placeswww.taalahooghan.org - Flagstaff Infoshopwww.blackfire.net

www.myspace.com/eelkwww.twitter.com/eelkSkype: indigenousaction

Navajo Nation, various tribal nations form united front to oppose any Arizona Snowbowl expansion

WINDOW ROCK, Ariz. -- On August 30 at the Flagstaff City Council's special meeting, the Navajo Nation alongside the Hopi Tribe, Havasupai Tribe, Pueblo of Zuni, Hualapai Tribe, White Mountain Apache Tribe, Fort McDowell Yavapai Nation, and many more tribal nations will stand strong and unified against the Arizona Snowbowl's proposed contract amendment to have the city of Flagstaff sell potable water to the ski resort for snowmaking purposes on the sacred San Francisco Peaks (Dook'o'oslííd).

On July 21, the 21st Navajo Nation Council voted overwhelmingly to implore the Flagstaff City Council to disapprove the proposed contract to sell potable water to Arizona Snowbowl for snowmaking on Dook'o'oslííd. The Navajo Nation reaffirmed its opposition to the expansion of the Arizona Snowbowl and reaffirmed its opposition to the further desecration of Dook'o'oslííd by the proposed use of treated wastewater.

Additionally, the Navajo Nation among other tribes maintains that clean drinking water is essential for all living beings, especially in the arid Arizona climate where water should not be wasted on non-essential recreational activities such as snowmaking.

Since the proposed contract, the Navajo Nation and neighboring tribes have formed an alliance that remains adamantly opposed to ski resort expansion using any type of reclaimed water.

Navajo Nation Council Delegate Thomas Walker, an integral leader on this issue stated, "The result of this appalling effort by Arizona Snowbowl has brought together an unprecedented and extensive alliance of tribes that will not rest until this issue is resolved appropriately."

"We have visited many tribes over the past month to build an alliance that with its synergy alone cannot be overcome locally, state-wide, or in Washington D.C," Walker added. "Without doubt our strength as unified tribes will be heard and felt on August 30."

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Preemptive Police Software by LAPD and Heat Beam to be used on Inmates

Sharing two articles here, one on preemptive policing and software being used by LAPD and a heat beam being tested to use on inmates. The fascist police state is intensifying.

We have to step up our resistance.

“Settle your quarrels, come together, understand the reality of our situation, understand that fascism is already here, that people are already dying who could be saved, that generations more will die or live poor butchered half-lives if you fail to act. Do what must be done, discover your humanity and your love in revolution. Pass on the torch. Join us, give up your life for the people.”

- George Jackson

Stopping crime before it starts

Sophisticated analysis of data can sometimes tell police where criminals are headed. It's academic now, but the LAPD plans to get involved.

Lt. Sean Malinowski oversees the department's crime analysis unit. He's spent years immersing himself in the world of predictive technology and has advised U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric Holder on the subject. (Anne Cusack / Los Angeles Times / March 18, 2010)

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The future of crime fighting begins with a story about strawberry Pop-Tarts, bad weather and Wal-Mart.

With a hurricane bearing down on the Florida coast several years ago, the retail giant sent supply trucks into the storm to stock shelves with the frosted pink pastries. The decision to do so had not been made on a whim or a hunch, but by a powerful computer that crunched reams of sales data and found an unusual but undeniable fact: When Mother Nature gets angry, people want to eat a lot more strawberry Pop-Tarts.

Officials in the Los Angeles Police Department are using the anecdote to explain a similar, but far more complicated, idea that they and researchers say could revolutionize law enforcement.

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"As police departments have gotten better at pushing down crime, we are looking now for the thing that will take us to the next level," LAPD Chief Charlie Beck said. "I firmly believe predictive policing is it."

Predictive policing is rooted in the notion that it is possible, through sophisticated computer analysis of information about previous crimes, to predict where and when crimes will occur. At universities and technology companies in the U.S. and abroad, scientists are working to develop computer programs that, in the most optimistic scenarios, could enable police to anticipate, and possibly prevent, many types of crime.

Some of the most ambitious work is being done at UCLA, where researchers are studying the ways criminals behave in urban settings.

One, who recently left UCLA to teach at Santa Clara University near San Jose is working to prove he can forecast the time and place of crimes using the same mathematical formulas that seismologists use to predict the distribution of aftershocks from an earthquake.

Another builds computer simulations of criminals roving through city neighborhoods in order to better understand why they tend to cluster in certain areas and how they disperse when police go looking for them.

"The naysayers want you to believe that humans are too complex and too random — that this sort of math can't be done," said Jeff Brantingham, a UCLA anthropologist who is helping to supervise the university's predictive policing project.

"But humans are not nearly as random as we think," he said. "In a sense, crime is just a physical process, and if you can explain how offenders move and how they mix with their victims, you can understand an incredible amount."

The LAPD has positioned itself aggressively at the center of the predictive policing universe, forging ties with the UCLA team and drawing up plans for a large-scale experiment to test whether predictive policing tools actually work. The department is considered a front-runner to beat out other big-city agencies in the fall for a $3-million U.S. Justice Department grant to conduct the multiyear tests.

LAPD officials have begun to imagine what a department built around predictive tools would look like.

Automated, detailed crime forecasts tailored to each of the department's 21 area stations would be streamed several times a day to commanders, who would use them to make decisions about where to deploy officers in the field.

For patrol officers on the streets, mapping software on in-car computers and hand-held devices would show continuous updates on the probability of various crimes occurring in the vicinity, along with the addresses and background information about paroled ex-convicts living in the area.

In turn, information gathered by officers from suspects, witnesses and victims would be fed in real time into a technology nerve center where predictive computer programs churn through huge crime databases.

If any of this ever becomes reality, it will be in large part because of Lt. Sean Malinowski, a bookish, soft-spoken former Fulbright scholar who oversees the department's crime analysis unit. With the blessing of former Chief William J. Bratton and now Beck, Malinowski has spent the last few years immersing himself in the world of predictive technologies.

In law enforcement circles, where confusion and skepticism about predictive policing run deep, he has established himself as one of only a few people who know both what it is to be a cop and how predictive technology could fit into the job. Malinowski was recently summoned to Washington by U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric Holder, who wanted a tutorial on the topic.

It is not by chance that the LAPD is pursuing predictive technologies. No city in the U.S. stands to gain more from the potential payoff than Los Angeles.

The city is one of the most severely under-policed in the country, with just shy of 10,000 police officers on its payroll. At any given time, only a fraction of them are on duty, spread across 469 square miles that are home to more than 4 million people. Predictive tools, if they work, would allow the LAPD to get more out of its meager force.

The use of crime data by police agencies is nothing new. Many big-city departments today make decisions on how to deploy officers based, in part, on computer mapping programs that track crime patterns and hot spots as they develop.

The LAPD and other agencies have become adept enough at channeling this flow of information from officers in the field that crimes committed in the evening are included on the next day's crime maps.

No matter how quickly crimes are plotted, however, these mapping programs leave cops stuck in reaction mode. They show where crimes have occurred in the past, but police still must make educated guesses about where future crimes will occur.

George Mohler and Martin Short believe they can change that.

In a yet-to-be-published research paper he wrote while at UCLA, Mohler, a mathematician, makes the case that the time and place of past crimes can be used to determine where and when future crimes are most likely to occur. To do this, he argues, police need to start thinking of crimes the way seismologists think of earthquakes and aftershocks.

Mohler's theory stems from a peculiar aspect of crime. Much as an earthquake sets off aftershocks, some types of crimes have a contagious quality to them.

When a home is burglarized, for example, the same house and others in its immediate surroundings are at much greater risk of being victimized in the days that follow. The phenomenon is called an exact or near-repeat effect.

The same dynamic can explain the way rival gangs retaliate against one another. And, although it is harder to pin down in more complex crimes that are motivated by passion or other emotions, experts believe it holds true there as well.

Mohler wasn't all that interested in what it is about criminals that makes this so. He focused instead on adapting the math formulas and computer programs that seismologists use to calculate the probability of aftershocks, fitting them to crime patterns. (Aftershocks can occur hundreds of miles from an epicenter and many months after an earthquake, while the elevated risk of burglaries and other crimes tends to subside over a matter of weeks and several city blocks.)

Using LAPD data, Mohler tested his computer model on several thousand burglaries that occurred in a large section of the San Fernando Valley throughout 2004 and 2005. The results, he said, were far more effective than anything on the market today.

The program divided the Valley area into patrol zones that were each roughly the size of several neighborhood blocks and then calculated which zones had the highest probability of experiencing burglaries the next day.

In one test, in which Mohler assumed there were enough cops to patrol 10% of the area, the model accurately identified the zones where the officers should have gone in order to thwart about a quarter of all the burglaries that occurred that day.

Mohler's approach is a bare-bones dissection of time and space. His former officemate is using high-level math to get inside criminals' minds.

Martin Short earned a doctorate in physics but, like Mohler, he spends much of his time thinking about crime. His research is based on a foundational, common-sense theory in criminology. In it, little attention is given to the social, economic or psychological factors — such as poverty, revenge, greed — that can motivate someone to commit a crime. Instead, criminals are viewed as rational decision-makers who commit crimes only when they come across opportunities that meet certain criteria.

For a crime to occur, the theory holds, a would-be criminal must find a target that is sufficiently vulnerable to attack and that offers an appealing payout. An empty house with no alarm on a poorly lighted street, for example, has a much higher chance of being burglarized than one with a barking dog on a busy block.

Short's computer models simulate this decision-making process and give him the chance to decipher how crime clusters form in certain areas that criminals consider prime for plunder. The present models are random and theoretical and therefore not capable of real-world predictions. But with enough funding and computer power, Short said, a far more sophisticated model could be built to replicate actual buildings in real neighborhoods in Los Angeles. Then, he suggested, the decisions of the computerized criminals could be used to predict the movements of actual criminals.

Like any radical, unproven idea, predictive policing has its share of skeptics. Some question whether any amount of number-crunching can replace the intuition and street smarts that a cop develops over time.

"There is the science of policing, and there is the art of policing," said LAPD Deputy Chief Michael Downing, who relies heavily on technology as the head of the department's counterterrorism efforts but remains wary of predictive policing.

"It is really important that we learn how to blend the two. If it becomes all about the science, I worry we'll lose the important nuances," he said.

It remains to be seen whether work like Mohler's and Short's can translate into helping cops make day-to-day decisions. The science has progressed only so far.

Much of the work at UCLA and other universities focuses on burglaries, because there are a lot of them and their times and locations are easy to pin down. Building predictive tools capable of addressing rarer and more complex crimes, such as homicides and rapes, will be far more complex.

Malinowski knows as well that the LAPD will have to overcome significant obstacles. Perhaps most pressing is the need to dramatically upgrade the department's technology infrastructure and improve the way it collects crime data.

And there is a public relations battle that must be won. Malinowski is trying to preempt the likely concerns of civil rights advocates who worry that predictive policing could be used to profile and harass individuals before they do anything wrong. He is quick to say that the technology will not turn the city into a real-life version of "Minority Report," a 2002 science fiction film in which cops arrest people for crimes they are about to commit.

"This will be the opposite of a dragnet, where we just go out and pick up everybody because they're on a certain street corner at the wrong time. We'll be basing our decision on facts. It will be dispassionate," he said. "We still have a Constitution, and we're still going to be arresting people based on probable cause, not on the probability that they'll commit a crime."

joel.rubin@latimes.com

L.A. jail tests 'intolerable heat' beam on brawling inmates

An L.A. county jail will be testing the Assault Intervention Device.

Officials at a Los Angeles County jail plan to test out an invisible heat-beam weapon originally developed by the military as a way to subdue brawling inmates by making them feel "intolerable heat."

The technology, called an Assault Intervention Device, is a non lethal-weapon developed by Raytheon Company. It originally was scaled down for use at the jail.

The device "emits a focused beam of wave energy that travels at the speed of light and produces an intolerable heating sensation that causes targeted individuals to flee. The sensation immediately ceases when the targeted individual moves away from the beam," according to Raytheon's website.

Deputies have tested the device, which is controlled by a jail officer using a joystick.

"We believe that technology can help solve problems facing the corrections community, including addressing issues of inmate violence," Sheriff Lee Baca said during a news conference. "The Assault Intervention Device appears uniquely suited to address some of the more difficult inmate violence issues without the drawbacks of tools currently available to us."

"This device will allow us to quickly intervene without having to enter the area and without incapacitating or injuring either combatant," Baca added.

Officials say they hope the device can help quell inmate assaults and reduce prison violence. Its use will be monitored by the U.S. Department of Justice's National Institute of Justice and Pennsylvania State University .

The device was installed and is being tested at Pitchess Detention Center at the L.A. County jail in Castaic , California .

That jail was the site of a 200-inmate brawl this weekend in which inmates threw rocks and debris at officers, who were attempting to stop them from entering a restricted area, according to CNN affiliate KTLA.

KTLA reported the hour-long brawl lasted for an hour before tear gas and non-lethal weapons were used. CNN is awaiting comment on whether the new Assault Intervention Device was employed during the brawl.

Frontlines and SB1070 from Tierra Y Libertad Organization - TYLO - SouthSide Tucson, AZ

Watch this video and check out some of the base-building grassroots all volunteer organizing work of Tierra Y Libertad Organization - TYLO over the last several months with families. The protection netowrks are a development we want to share across the nation.

TYLO - The work that we do together is critical, many of our community members suffer the real consequences of militarization policies and unjust laws like SB1070. Through our Protection Networks and our wonderful community support we have gotten one of our

community members out of ICE detention today. Thank you for your help with bail fundraising and for writing letters of support.

Watch the video. It details some of the hard work that Tierra Y Libertad Organization - TYLO and We Reject Racism have done over the last months with youth and families in Tucson.

Watch video:

http://vimeo.com/14036289

cesar

TYLO

These are the Frontlines...

"THESE ARE THE FRONT LINES" - CONFRONTING the racist attacks and legislation's such as SB1070 - CHALLENGING the police state and racist vigilantism, and building A NETWORK of revolutionary strategies and organization. $5 donation, food will be sold ,info booths ..free child care Schedule/Program: arrive early limted seating , spanish interpreter Schedule: 5:00pm doors open 5:30 - 6:00 PM Food, DJ Matt, Slide Show 6:00- 6:15 PM Naui Huitzilopochtli aka nauiocelotl's youtube videos 6:15- 6:30 PM Testimonies 6:30-7:10 PM ÒJornaleros En LuchaÓ W/ Q&A 7:10-10:00 PM Panel Discussion W/ Q&A from the audience: Immortal Technique Cop Watch Los Angeles Mexica Movement's-Nelyollotl Toltecatl (muralist,speaker) Black Riders Liberation Party Tongva Nation ACLU Pomona Day labor center South Asain Network WHERE: Neighborhood Community Center 1845 Park ave Costa Mesa, CA GOOGLE MAP IT! ALSO BROADCATING LIVE ON RAISE THE FIST RADIO 98.5 FM (Lynwood, Watts, Compton, N. Carson, N. Long Beach) & streaming world wide at: http://www.raisethefist.com/radio (tune in)

5pm-10:30pm $5 donation Neighborhood Community Center 1845 Park Costa Mesa, CA

Black August Event for George Jackson Day

Cop Watch LA members will be doing a presentation on Black And Brown unity

Time
August 21 · 6:00pm - 10:00pm
Location Rahmann's Art Gallery
122 N. Market St
Inglewood, CA
Created By
Rykiell Rhea-Turner
More Info Join Sons & Daughters of Sankofa for a night filled with history, culture and action!
Learn the TRUE history of Black August. Connect with others, expand your political knowledge, meet with knowledgeable leaders and share your ideas, thoughts and actions.
We will enjoy spoken word, video clips, speakers, visual arts and more!
Speakers & Performers:
Kumasi – Historian* Grasshoppa – Host Tha Cold Soulja *Lorenzo - Poet
Brandi Kane – Rap *Aqebi – Libation *Jabari – Health Tip with Q&A
Dojah – Poet *Sadiki – Poet* Kaleid – Rap *Agustus “Final Poet” – Poem
Jitu War Control *Kumasi – Rap *Food 4 Thought - Poet
Art/Pictures
George Jackson *Jonathan Jackson* William Christmas *James Mc Clain * Russell Mc Gee* H Rap Brown and Much more….
Films:
Huey P. Newton: Rally Speech* Malcolm X: Speech in LA on Ronald Stokes
**Food will be Provided**
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"The Struggle for Human Rights and Dignity Against Torture"
myspace.com/lablackaugust

Update on Political Prisoner Ramsey Muniz

Dear Friends:
Below are excerpts of the last appeal submitted by Ramsey Muniz. (See the attached). The appeal cites the trial transcript and describes how the government maneuvered and set up Ramsey Muniz to obtain a conviction at any cost – intentionally, maliciously, and with deceit. Feel free to share this legal document. It is public court information.
The judge did not rule in our favor, but this does not change truth. It does not remove the manner in which the government maneuvered and set up Ramsey Muniz to obtain a wrongful conviction.
We send this information for the sake of our supporters, and to share the facts with the general public. The National Committee to Free Ramsey Muniz asks that readers forward this information to law students and organizations and that are concerned about freeing those who are wrongfully incarcerated.

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STATEMENT OF FACTS

Ramsey Ramiro Muniz was arrested on March 11, 1994, in Lewisville, Texas. The events leading to his arrest began in Houston the day before that date. (T.R. 197-1990).
On March 10, 1994, Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Agent Kimberly Elliott received a telephone call in Dallas from the DEA Office in Houston asking her to maintain surveillance on a man (later identified as Donacio Medina) flying from Houston and arriving at Dallas’s Love field. (Id.). At approximately 6:00 p.m. on that date, Agent Elliott saw a man at Love Field airport fitting the description supplied by the Houston DEA office meet Muniz in the airport. The two of them were met at the curb by a man driving a gray car. (T.R. 100-200, 390). The gray car, with three people in it, was followed north from the airport to the Frisco, Texas, area when the surveillance was discontinued. (T.R. 200).
Soon after the surveillance had been discontinued, Agent Elliott received another phone call from the Houston DEA office during which she was given a telephone and a room number for a Ramada Inn in Lewisville, Texas. (T.R. 201-202). Agent Elliott went to the Ramada Inn at 10:30 p.m. on March 10, 1994, and spoke with some of its employees. (T.R. 202). She learned that Muniz had checked into the Ramada Inn under his own name. She took copies of his business card left by him at the front desk and of the telephone toll records for the motel’s rooms. (T.R. 204-206). Agent Elliott also wrote down the license plate of the card parked in the parking lot. (T.R. 202), Surveillance was discontinued until the following morning.

Page 2 of Appeal

B. Trial counsel failed to raise an entrapment defense when Movant-Appellant acting as a legal assistant became the target of a DEA investigation through his client acting as an informant.

Page 3 of Appeal

In this regard, and based on the facts of this case, Muniz’s initial contention is that the trial counsel failed to request the affirmative defense of entrapment. Muniz asserts that he was induced to violate the law by the activities of Donacio Medina, a government agent. Once Medina decided to cooperate with the DEA in Houston, he was, for the purposes of the entrapment doctrine, acting for the government. United States v. Martinez-Carcano, 557 F.2d 966, 970 (5th Cir. 1977). Thereafter, there wa ample evidence of government inducement in the limited sense applicable here. For example, prior to the fact that Muniz accepted the keys from Juan Gonzales and moved the white car from the Ramada Inn to the La Quinta Inn on the morning of March 11, 1994, there was a lot of speculation, innuendo, and conjecture that attempted to show that Muniz knew there was cocaine in the trunk of the white car. But the real issue here is the ultimate question basic to all claims of entrapment: Was Muniz ready and willing to commit the offense if given the opportunity to do so, or was Muniz just an innocent victim of a government set up?
Muniz claims the answers to these questions would have developed better at trial if counsel would have requested the defense of entrapment. Evidence adduced at trial clearly showed that Muniz was in Dallas to visit clients. Medina was a client recommended by Moises Andrade, a prominent businessman from Matamoros, Mexico. (T.R. 969). There is no evidence to show that Medina and Muniz were acquainted prior to their meeting at Dallas’ Love Field. In fact, the evidence proves contrary.
Thus, this transient relationship begs the questions: How often do drug dealers do an $800,000 deal with a perfect stranger? Who supplied the cocaine? Who was supposed to receive the cocaine? Ostensibly, the government is unconcerned. The conclusion is obvious. Medina was supposed to put the cocaine in the hands of Ramsey Muniz. Muniz was the target of the DEA sting operation from its inception. And Medina was the confidential informant who set up the deal.
In its opinion, the Fifth Circuit stated that Agents had reasonable suspicion justifying stop of defendants where agents knew that they were connected with activity of suspected drug trafficker with whom the DEA was negotiating a drug sale. United States v. Gonzales, 79 F.3d 413, 422 (5th Cir. 1996). Indeed, the deal was done insofar as the Dallas’ DEA agents were concerned. Their objective was accomplished. Dallas DEA agents knew from the beginning what was going to happen from the time Medina left Houston until the scheduled meeting with Muniz and the DEA at 10:00 a.m. on March 11, 1994. The DEA through Medina acting as their agent were in complete control of the situation. There is no other explanation why DEA Agent Elliott was able to break off surveillance at 11:00 p.m. on March 10, 1994, and reassemble at 8:45 a.m. the following morning. They knew the cocaine had arrived and was stashed in the trunk of the white car. They knew the cocaine would not be transported during the night because they had scheduled the deal to go down at approximately 10:00 a.m. on the morning of March 11, 1994. They knew Medina would be taken to the airport at Love Field, and they knew that Muniz and Gonzales were supposed to move the car to the La Quinta Inn. They were just waiting for Muniz and Gonzales to get into the car and move it before they could make the arrest under a pretextual investigative stop.
Furthermore, Fed-Ex driver Gallardo testified that he took Medina to the Classic Inn. When Medina did not see the car he was looking for at the Classic Inn, he asked Gallardo to take him to the Ramada Inn in Lewisville, Texas. Presumably, Media was looking for the white car which had already been moved to the Ramada Inn by Hernandez who was registered at the Classic Inn from March 6 thru 10, 1994. Id. at 424, 425. The question of how the white car arrived at the parking lot of the Ramada Inn was never answered. However, it was confirmed later by Agent Elliott after she wrote down the license plates that the white car was indeed located at the Ramada Inn before she broke off surveillance at 11:00 p.m. on March 10, 1994.
Upon their arrival at the Ramada Inn around 10:30 p.m. on March 10, 1994, Gallardo and Medina saw Muniz carrying a bag of groceries. (T.R. 903). Muniz and Medina went into the lobby together where Medina was hailed by a young man in his mid-to-late twenties. At that time, Medina took leave of Muniz’s company and was not seen by Muniz again until the following morning at approximately 8:30 a.m. Apparently, the young man in his mid-to-late twenties was Danny Hernandez. After parking the white car in the parking lot, he waited for Medina to arrive. Al these events that occurred prior to the time that Muniz was arrested after driving the white car happened without Muniz’s knowledge. Knowledge is precisely the element of the offenses charged that was not successfully challenged by defense counsel at trial.
The government has the burden to prove each element of the offenses, and that one element of the offense in question is the “knowing” action by Muniz. The word “knowingly” means that the act was done voluntarily and intentionally and not because of mistake or accident. United States v.Rubio, 834 F.2d 442, 448 (5th Cr. 1987).

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