Jun 29, 2008 04:47PM GMT
Question
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Politics - Other
Black Water is building Training Camps for $20 million apiece in 4 U.S. Regions?
Much unlike my usual polls this one is not for or againstany political group. This should be of interest to all of us.
I read in my morning paper The Spokesman Review
on June 29th, 2008 that Black Water is going to
build it's next facility in Idaho near Worley. Now, I find
out that this group has been training local police depts
C.I.A and F.B.I. Whether you agree with Black Water in Iraq or
not, is not the question here. Do you want Military Contractors
with little or no accountability training local Law Enforcement?
And on the Federal Level, why should Black Water be
hired when we already have an Army, Navy, Marines
and Air Force. Does this bother you? It bothered me.
Wayne Madsen Report 10-15-7
The mercenary firm Blackwater USA is well known for the controversy involving its "shoot first, ask no questions" policy in Iraq. It is also known that Louisiana's Department of Homeland Security contracted with Blackwater to provide public law enforcement services in New Orleans following hurricane Katrina.Blackwater is also planning to establish regional training centers in Potrero,California and Mount Carroll, Illinois, billed as Blackwater West and Blackwater North, respectively.
These training centers, in addition to Blackwater's Lodge and Training Center in Moyock, North Carolina -- Blackwater East -- and a possible fourth rumored to be slated for the Pacific Northwest -- Blackwater Northwest -- may result in the establishment of a network of Blackwater-trained police, sheriffs, and other police units around the country.
Given Blackwater's dismal record on human rights and brutality, this spells trouble for civilian control of police and paramilitary forces in the United States, from major metropolitan areas to small rural towns.
On October 14, the Washington Post ran a story, which included photographs from Blackwater's Moyock training center. However, what was most intriguing was a photograph of a police and military patch board at Blackwater's headquarters that indicated the police agencies that have sent their officers to Moyock for training.
Blackwater is secretive about its non-federal, as well as its foreign clients, which the Post pointed out includes Jordan, Azerbaijan, and Burkina Faso, but a WMR inspection of the photograph of the police agencies has yielded the following list of agencies that have used Blackwater for training:
1. Iowa Department of Natural Resources
2. Maricopa County, Arizona Sheriff's Department
3. Matthews, North Carolina Police
4. Atlanta Police
5. Chillicothe, Ohio Police
6. Charleston, South Carolina Police
7. Port Chester, NY Police
8. Highland, Indiana Police
9. Unalaska, Alaska Police
10. Metropolitan Washington, DC Police
11. Charlottesville, Virginia Police
12. Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority (Dulles and Reagan National Airports)
13. St. Louis County Police (Missouri)
14. Queen Anne's County, Maryland Police
15. Prince George's County, Maryland Police
16. FBI SWAT Team
17. Gloucester Township, New Jersey Police
18. Tempe, Arizona Police
19. New York Police Department
20. Yonkers, New York Police
21. Fairfax County, Virginia Police
22. Maplewood, New Jersey Police
23. Gastonia, North Carolina Police
24. Tampa Police
25. U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA)
26. DeKalb County, Georgia Police
27. Arlington County, Virginia Police
28. Baltimore Police
29. U.S. Coast Guard
30. Suffolk, Virginia Police
31. Franklin City, Virginia Police
32. Milford, Delaware Police
33. University of Texas Police
34. Norfolk, Virginia Police
35. Ottawa-Carleton, Canada Police
36. San Bernardino County, California Sheriff
37. Plattsburgh, New York Police
38. Chicago Police Department
39. Oregon State Police
40. Los Angeles Police Department
41. Tonawanda, New York Police
42. Special Forces of Colombia
43. Jacksonville, North Carolina Police
44. Harvey Cedars, New Jersey Police
45. Elmira, New York Police
46. Department of Corrections, New Jersey
47. Lexington, Kentucky Police
48. Willimantic, Connecticut Police
49. Georgia Department of Law Enforcement
50. City of Fairfax, Virginia Police
51. Alexandria, Virginia Police Special Operations
52. Illinois State Police
53. Dallas, Texas Police
54. Hamilton, Ohio Police
55. Morganton, North Carolina Police
A number of the police departments that have been trained by Blackwater have abysmal civil rights and police brutality records, most notably the Chicago Police and Illinois State Police, both cited by former Illinois Governor George Ryan as being guilty of police misconduct in his decision to commute the death sentences of Illinois' death row inmates.
It was a decision that likely had much to do with his indictment by the Bush administration on corruption charges -- political misuse of the Department of Justice that has been seen in the indictments and investigations of Alabama former Democratic Governor Don Siegelman and HealthSouth former CEO Richard Scrushy, Qwest's former CEO Joseph Nacchio, Democratic campaign contributor Martha Stewart, Coastal Corporation's former Chairman and Democratic contributor Oscar Wyatt, and Democratic-leaning trial attorneys around the United States, as well as the firings of several U.S. Attorneys who refused to engage in political prosecutions, and a Justice Department workup on North Carolina presidential candidate John Edwards in 2004.
The training and potential political indoctrination of police officers by the extreme right-wing and proto-fascist Blackwater, coupled with the politicization of the Justice Department and U.S. courts, has the potential for the streets of Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Atlanta, New York, and Washington, DC, as well as Chillicothe, Harvey Cedars, and Elmira to turn as bloody as the streets of Baghdad and Fallujah.
Citizens have a distinct opportunity of confronting their local elected city, county, and town officials over Blackwater training of their police officers. Local officials should be pressured to reveal the numbers and identities of officers trained by Blackwater, the subjects covered by the training, the revenues spent, and a public demand should be made to cease and desist in such training.
Copyright 2005-2007 WayneMadsenReport.com
Posted by Michael Difensore at 6:00 AM
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Hi! That's because the "justice" dept. threatens to "go after" anyone for "national security" reasons. So they publish something once and drop the issue as fast as they can. You seem to never hear about it ever again. The elections are a big part of the reason. If they print it to often--people will start digging, and demanding answers to their questions.
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Answered I don't mind it at all because
First off,
I mistakenly selected, "I don't mind it at all because"
forgive my errant mouse, I wanted to choose "Why do they need to build all these bases in the U.S.?"
The militarization of our police force has the potential to become one of our worst problems in America, if it isn't already.
From the military "tacticool" training, to their growing "us against them" attitude, to the thin blue line mindset, police are fast becoming the new jackbooted stormtroopers.
Look at the way in which mala phohibita is described...The war on some drugs, the war on gun violence, the war on terrorism, the war on freedom, OK, so they have not named that one yet, but it is a war nonetheless.
Examples you say?
Williams said he believes the team was supposed to be raiding a parolee’s home Aug. 24 when they inadvertently hit the wrong door. Officers ended up at the home of David and Lillian Scott, just off Rancho California Road.
Lillian Scott said she and her husband were in the living room discussing family plans, their 15-year-old daughter was in the garage with two friends and their 16-year-old son was in another room feeding the Scotts’ 5-month-old baby.
That all changed at 9:35 p.m. she said, when Temecula police officers —- four or five, she’s not sure —– carrying rifles charged though the unlocked front screen door and ordered the couple to the floor.
“Two of them came over and put handcuffs on the two of us,” Lillian Scott said. “We asked what ...First off,
I mistakenly selected, "I don't mind it at all because"
forgive my errant mouse, I wanted to choose "Why do they need to build all these bases in the U.S.?"
The militarization of our police force has the potential to become one of our worst problems in America, if it isn't already.
From the military "tacticool" training, to their growing "us against them" attitude, to the thin blue line mindset, police are fast becoming the new jackbooted stormtroopers.
Look at the way in which mala phohibita is described...The war on some drugs, the war on gun violence, the war on terrorism, the war on freedom, OK, so they have not named that one yet, but it is a war nonetheless.
Examples you say?
Williams said he believes the team was supposed to be raiding a parolee’s home Aug. 24 when they inadvertently hit the wrong door. Officers ended up at the home of David and Lillian Scott, just off Rancho California Road.
Lillian Scott said she and her husband were in the living room discussing family plans, their 15-year-old daughter was in the garage with two friends and their 16-year-old son was in another room feeding the Scotts’ 5-month-old baby.
That all changed at 9:35 p.m. she said, when Temecula police officers —- four or five, she’s not sure —– carrying rifles charged though the unlocked front screen door and ordered the couple to the floor.
“Two of them came over and put handcuffs on the two of us,” Lillian Scott said. “We asked what we had done wrong and didn’t get an answer.”
Elsewhere in the house other officers handcuffed their daughter and her two friends.
“(The officers) told them to get down on the f—ing floor,” she said.
Her 16-year-old son, who was feeding the baby, was also ordered to the floor and handcuffed, Scott said.
From the other room, Scott heard her infant crying.
“I asked if my baby was OK and the officer told me if I moved he was going to put a bullet in my head,” Scott said.”
These increasingly frequent raids, 40,000 per year by one estimate, are needlessly subjecting nonviolent drug offenders, bystanders, and wrongly targeted civilians to the terror of having their homes invaded while they’re sleeping, usually by teams of heavily armed paramilitary units dressed not as police officers but as soldiers. These raids bring unnecessary violence and provocation to nonviolent drug offenders, many of whom were guilty of only misdemeanors. The raids terrorize innocents when police mistakenly target the wrong residence. And they have resulted in dozens of needless deaths and injuries, not only of drug offenders, but also of police officers, children, bystanders, and innocent suspects.
http://www.cato.org/pub_displ...(less) -
You are one smart cookie Molly,
I have hundreds of real world examples of our current police state.
From "peace officers" having a shootout among themselves right here locally, to BATFE officers stomping a familys kittens to death in front of their children, half way across the country.
In neither of these cases were the victims "familys" found guilty of, or even charged with any wrong doing.
These are the sanctioned criminals who will enforce the war on smoking, the war on firearms, the war on parents rights, the war on(insert your own noun)....... -
Answered First, I heard about this but I don't like it because
I don't know - I think it's more of the same deregulation going on. The government doesn't like to be accountable, so they'll hire thugs with less traditional training, which cost money and they'll save. Or they supply a contractor with some more pork. Gotta love $30,000 toilet seats. Not sure of the financial details. -
HI Tim, They are about 45 miles from me over the state line into Idaho. But I also see that on a few web sites I have visited there are groups watching them and protesting them. Why the hell do they need 'bases' in 4 quadrants of the country. Hell the Marines only have two. Thanks for your imput as info becomes available I'll let you know.
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Answered Undecided
Police are already so corrupt, I do not se how this group could possibly make it worse.
Just recently, in Indianapolis, 3 officers arrested for dealing drugs from a music store a 4th person they knew owned. FBI arrested these men for stealing illegal drugs from people and reselling through the music store.
New York, 4 officers aquitted of murdering an unarmed civilian, who was shot like 50 times.
I don't feel like looking for any stories, these 2 stick and should be known or easily researched.
Welcome to corruption, it runs rampant in every industry in our society, just got to learn to live with it. -
Answered First, I heard about this but I don't like it because
because our police departments tend to be corrupt enough. We don't need them getting worse with "shoot first, ask no questions" training!