TSA May Buy Even More Controversial Body Scanners

aviationpros.com | May 22, 2012

Despite the controversy over whether they pose a health risk, the Transportation Security Administration says it may purchase even more airport scanners that emit radiation to check passengers.

TSA spokesman Jonathan Allen said in coming months the agency plans to test software that would allow radiation-emitting scanners, known as backscatter units, to generate generic body images. Currently, these units generate naked images of passengers that resemble chalk etchings.

“When that software meets TSA’s standards and is successfully tested in an airport environment, TSA could purchase and deploy additional backscatter units,” he said.

The TSA says scanners are critical to its efforts to thwart potential terrorism attempts, in addition to making passenger screening more efficient. The agency stepped up its use of scanners after an al-Qaida operative attempted to detonate a bomb in his underwear aboard an Amsterdam-to-Detroit flight in December 2009.

This week, the CIA thwarted a similar plot in Yemen, although U.S. counter-terrorism officials are investigating whether scanners would have detected the new bomb since it had no metal parts, according to The Associated Press.

The TSA relies on two kinds of scanners: the backscatter machines, which use radiation, and millimeter wave scanners, which are considered safer because they do not.

The backscatter machines are installed at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood and Orlando international airports. The millimeter wave scanners are used at the Palm Beach and Miami international airports.

In November, the European Union banned the backscatter units, fearing they held potential to cause cancer in some passengers. That prompted Broward County officials to question whether they should be allowed at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport.

Broward Mayor John Rodstrom, a frequent flier who refuses to go through scanners, said he was disappointed the TSA is considering buying more backscatter scanners.

“I find it unfortunate in the respect that radiation cannot be in any way good for you,” he said. “Given that they have an alternative, and why they won’t embrace that alternative, is beyond me.”

TSA administrator John Pistole said the agency has conducted “intense research, analysis and independent testing” and concluded the units pose no danger.

He said a person could receive 5,000 airport screenings every year without exceeding the radiation does limit set by the American National Standards Institute/Health Physics Society.

“This would require an average of 15 screenings a day, every day, for a year,” Pistole wrote in a letter to Kent George, director of the Broward County Aviation Department. “In fact, the average person receives more radiation from the natural environment each hour than from one screening by a backscatter system.” .

Some medical experts disagree, saying that the ionizing radiation of the units creates a risk for women genetically predisposed to breast cancer and people over age 65.

Among the experts is Dr. Edward Dauer, head of radiology at Florida Medical Center in Fort Lauderdale. He said ionizing radiation breaks down electrons and DNA, which can cause death or cancer.

His concerns were echoed by to a group of scientists from the University of California, San Francisco. They note the cosmic radiation that infiltrates airliners is absorbed by the whole body and less dangerous than ionizing radiation of the scanners, which only goes skin deep.

Passengers can opt to bypass the body scanners but then are subject to a secondary screening and possibly a pat-down. Allen said about 1 percent of air travelers avoid the scanners, and don’t have to cite a reason why.

In all, the TSA has installed about 700 body scanners at 180 U.S. airports. Of those, about 245 are backscatter machines, in use at about 40 airports. About 455 are millimeter-wave scanners in use at about 140 airports.

Allen said in September 2011, the TSA ordered 300 millimeter-wave scanners but no backscatter machines.

Darpa, Venter Launch Assembly Line To Massively Accelerate Genetic Engineering

Darpa’s “Living Foundries” program is looking to “transform biology into an engineering practice.” Photo: VA

The process, once established, ought to massively accelerate the pace of bio-engineering

Wired | May 22, 2012

By Katie Drummond

The military-industrial complex just got a little bit livelier. Quite literally.

That’s because Darpa, the Pentagon’s far-out research arm, has kicked off a program designed to take the conventions of manufacturing and apply them to living cells. Think of it like an assembly line, but one that would churn out modified biological matter — man-made organisms — instead of cars or computer parts.

The program, called “Living Foundries,” was first announced by the agency last year. Now, Darpa’s handed out seven research awards worth $15.5 million to six different companies and institutions. Among them are several Darpa favorites, including the University of Texas at Austin and the California Institute of Technology. Two contracts were also issued to the J. Craig Venter Institute. Dr. Venter is something of a biology superstar: He was among the first scientists to sequence a human genome, and his institute was, in 2010, the first to develop an entirely synthetic organism.

“Living Foundries” aspires to turn the slow, messy process of genetic engineering into a streamlined and standardized one. Of course, the field is already a burgeoning one: Scientists have tweaked cells in order to develop renewable petroleum and spider silk that’s tough as steel. And a host of companies are investigating the pharmaceutical and agricultural promise lurking — with some tinkering, of course — inside living cells.

But those breakthroughs, while exciting, have also been time-consuming and expensive. As Darpa notes, even the most cutting-edge synthetic biology projects “often take 7+ years and tens to hundreds of millions of dollars” to complete. Venter’s synthetic cell project, for example, cost an estimated $40 million.

Synthetic biology, as Darpa notes, has the potential to yield “new materials, novel capabilities, fuel and medicines” — everything from fuels to solar cells to vaccines could be produced by engineering different living cells. But the agency isn’t content to wait seven years for each new innovation. In fact, they want the capability for “on-demand production” of whatever bio-product suits the military’s immediate needs.

To do it, Darpa will need to revamp the process of bio-engineering — from the initial design of a new material, to its construction, to its subsequent efficacy evaluation. The starting point, and one that agency-funded researchers will have to create, is a library of “modular genetic parts”: Standardized biological units that can be assembled in different ways — like LEGO — to create different materials.

Once that library is created, the agency wants researchers to come up with a set of “parts, regulators, devices and circuits” that can reliably yield various genetic systems. After that, they’ll also need “test platforms” to quickly evaluate new bio-materials. Think of it as a biological assembly line: Products are designed, pieced together using standardized tools and techniques, and then tested for efficacy.

The process, once established, ought to massively accelerate the pace of bio-engineering — and cut costs. The agency’s asking researchers to “compress the biological design-build-test cycle by at least 10X in both time and cost,” while also “increasing the complexity of systems that can be designed and executed.”

No doubt, Darpa’s making some big asks of the scientists tasked with this research. And not everyone’s convinced they’ll pull it off. “The biology will fight them,” Daniel Drell, a program manager with the U.S. Department of Energy, predicted last year. Which suggests it might be a few years, at least, before Darpa’s bio-creations try to fight us.

No escaping hobo cop: New tactic aims to catch drivers using cellphones on the road

RCMP Const. Bryan Martell dressed as a panhandler in B.C. in March 2012 to catch drivers talking on their cellphones. More than 20 tickets were handed out.

A “sneaky and unsavoury tactic.”

nationalpost.com | May 2, 2012

by Adrian Humphreys

BURLINGTON, Ont. — A scruffy looking man — hoodie up, clutching a tattered sign scrawled on a scrap of cardboard — shuffled up to a car at a busy intersection in this city west of Toronto. Drivers instinctively looked away.

But this sign’s wording was different from the usual begging appeal: “My name is Constable Mike Cairns. If you are reading this sign you are about to get a cell phone ticket.”

Witness the latest police tactic in the crackdown on distracted drivers.

Across Canada over the past several weeks, police officers have been dressing as panhandlers and clutching cardboard signs to mimic the curbside come-ons in order to get close enough to see drivers using handheld phones while driving.

In a growing list of cities, the unusual undercover tactic is snagging motorists who are texting, dialling, emailing or holding cell phones.

In Ottawa, an officer with an eye for authenticity scrawled “God bless” at the end of his cardboard sign.

In Salmon Arm, B.C., an RCMP corporal had spelling errors and a smiley face drawn on his sign as he plodded up and down a meridian in the Trans-Canada Highway wearing a tussled wig and using a single crutch.

And in an apparent Canadian first in the genre, RCMP Constable Bryan Martell in Chilliwack, B.C., has been wearing a hoodie pulled up over a baseball cap with a pair of baggy, combat fatigue pants while clutching his greasy, cardboard sign written in all capital letters.

The tactic is dubbed Hobo Cops.

But not everyone is happy with it.

Anti-poverty activists say it damages the already strangled reception of beggars from motorists and diminishes their daily take.

“We don’t want to give panhandlers a bad name by people thinking that they’re cops,” said John Clarke, an organizer with the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty.

“They are displacing people who are trying to survive by panhandling. The level of social cutbacks is such that, for panhandlers, there are no survival margins at all. And from a general decency point of view, it is a sneaky and unsavoury tactic.”

Despite the complaints, the new tactic’s success is apparent.

In Burlington, over two days this week, two youthful-looking officers pulled hoodies over baseball caps and stood with their signs at the intersection of Guelph Line and Fairview Street, a bustling, multi-lane thoroughfare featuring a large shopping mall, gas station, car dealership and other stores.

Drivers often turned away from the approaching men. Almost none bothered to read the sign as they approached. The officers had to knock on the windows of some before they looked up from their iPhone or BlackBerry.

The idea is for police to have a way to walk up to the vehicles and look inside to see what motorists are doing without drivers adjusting their behaviour the way they would if a uniformed officer stood there.

“It’s the texters that are the most dangerous and they’re the most difficult to catch,” said Sergeant Chantal Corner of Halton Regional Police who helped run Burlington’s hobo sting.

“Cell phone users, you can see them holding their phone up to their ear, but those texting — you see them driving around with their head down but you can’t see the device. It’s hard to prove they were texting. By the time we pull them over they have put it away and deny it.”

Officers wore their police badges on a chain around their neck and identified themselves when interacting with a distracted driver, ordering them to pull over where uniformed colleagues were waiting. Two drivers tried to flee but were apprehended, said Sgt. Corner.

The officers handed out 61 provincial offence notices for distracted driving offences on Monday and another 111 on Tuesday. The numbers from Wednesday’s enforcement blitz were not yet available.

“We understand people will be upset. Nobody likes to get a ticket. But the other 90% of the people, they thought it was great. People were saying it’s about time,” said Sgt. Corner.

One driver defended herself by saying she grabbed the phone to avoid a confrontation with a suspected beggar. Sgt. Corner checked with the undercover officer, who said the driver pulled up at the intersection already on the phone.

It is the kind of discrepancy that needs to be settled in court and is part of the shaking out process every new police tactic typically needs.

“Distracted driving is so rampant,” said Sgt. Corner. “We need to send the message: put the phone in your purse or in the trunk or in the back seat, anything to help you avoid the temptation of that buzzing.”

The hobo cop is a variation on undercover techniques police use to avoid suspicion as they watch for crimes and infractions.

Over Easter, an RCMP sergeant in Nanaimo, B.C., wore a seven-foot-tall Easter Bunny costume and pranced around busy intersections looking into cars. Few motorists would have pegged him as an officer. Other forces have had officers dress up as city workers and construction workers.

Retired RCMP constable Tim Shewe, who spent 20 years working in traffic enforcement and another 10 years in collision investigation, defended the techniques.

“How would you deal with distracted driving when you are in a marked cruiser you can see a mile away? They see you, put the phone down and sit back straight until the officer is out of sight and then go right back to it. People have to learn and if that means officers not being visible then that’s the way to do it,” he said.

Intelligence expert Crispin Black on why sex games feature in so many spy deaths

dailyrecord.co.uk | May 5 2012

By Crispin Black - former government intelligence adviser

SITTING at the Gareth Williams inquest this week, listening to the more lurid details of the case, it occurred to me the death of spooks in bizarre circumstances involving sex games or women’s clothing is hardly an unusual event.

Disposing of an enemy and making it look like a perverted fantasy gone wrong is in the training manuals of every spy agency from MI6 to Mossad.

Codebreaker Gareth, from Anglesey, north Wales, was found dead in a locked bag, in a flat full of women’s clothing and wigs and with his internet browsing history conveniently featuring bondage sites, sparking a flurry of allegations which horrified his parents.

But the fact the 31-year-old’s death scene was organised in such a way as to suggest a sex game gone wrong should make us more suspicious, not less.

The sex game cover is a very useful mechanism in a murder. Not only does it provide a disguise for the actual means and method of death, it trashes the reputation of the victim and blunts the energy of any subsequent investigation.

And it appears to explain the astonishing number of spies, and other people who step into their murky world, who turn up dead in circumstances similar to Gareth.

Take GCHQ personnel for instance, those that work at the vast electronic doughnut in Cheltenham that is responsible for intercepting and decoding secret electronic traffic of interest to Her Majesty’s Government. And Gareth’s ultimate employer.

MI6 dirty secrets.. why do sex games appear to feature in so many spy deaths?

Sex, spies and seven suspicious deaths: The murky waters of the intelligence world – coincidence or conspiracy?

In 1983, 25-year-old Stephen Drinkwater, who worked as a clerk at GCHQ, was found dead at his home with a plastic bag over his head. In 1997 another worker, Nicholas Husband, 46, was found dead at home dressed in a bra and panties – with a plastic bag over his head.

Two years later, Kevin Allen, 31, a language expert at GCHQ, was found dead in his bed with a plastic bag over his head and a dust mask over his mouth. One wonders what the Gloucestershire Constabulary make of it all.

To be fair, the kind of higher mathematical ability that many GCHQ codebreakers have is rare and it sometimes comes with some personal eccentricities attached.

Alan Turing, the Cambridge academic and founder of modern computer science who became the greatest of the wartime Bletchley Park codebreakers was a distinctly odd fish – a loner with sexual hang-ups who seemed to spend most of his waking hours dreaming of obscure mathematical theorems.

The point was amusingly made in 60s film The Italian Job in which Charlie Croker, played by Michael Caine, recruits computer genius Professor Simon Peach – Benny Hill – to pull off a daring bullion robbery.

But the whole scheme nearly comes unstuck as Prof Peach is unable to control his powerful urges towards large women. MI6, who recruit a more worldly-wise type than the boffins of GCHQ, have not been immune.

In 1994 ex-MI6 man turned journalist James Rusbridger, 65, was found hanged at his house in Cornwall – in a green chemical protection suit including rubber gloves, gas mask and black plastic mackintosh. Bondage pictures completed the tableau.

And of course, according to the pathologist, it turned out he probably did it himself as part of a sex game.

The same year Stephen Milligan, the Tory MP for Eastleigh, was found dead with electrical flex tied round his neck, a black bin liner over his head and wearing stockings and suspenders.

The 45-year-old was also tied to a chair and had a satsuma stuffed into his mouth.

His boss at the time, then junior defence minister Jonathan Aitken, has since denied suggestions Milligan had links to MI6.

Even if you are not a spook you need to be careful. In 1990, ex-RAF helicopter pilot and editor of Defence Helicopter World Jonathan Moyle, 28, was found hanged in the wardrobe of his hotel in Chile with a pillow case over his head.

At the time his demise was widely thought to be an auto-erotic accident. He was in fact almost certainly murdered after uncovering links between Chilean arms dealers and Saddam Hussein.

The last person to give evidence at the Gareth Williams inquest was Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire – the senior investigating officer in the case.

She stated confidently that she was sure she and her team would be able to unlock the mystery in the end. But she also felt that this, her final appearance in court, was an appropriate time to remind the assembled audience of Williams’s internet browsing habits.

The last website he accessed probably just a few hours before his death was connected to cycling – a photo of him competing in a cross-country cycling race has been seen frequently in the national newspapers.

But then she went on to deal with the browsing information that had been made much of in the media over the last 20 months. Williams had accessed bondage websites on four days over a two-year period.

He had never accessed so-called “claustrophilia” sites which cater for people who get a thrill out of being confined in small spaces.

There we have it – the view of the woman in charge of the probe. Williams may have had a passing interest in bondage but no more than that. Even this passing interest may have a perfectly innocent explanation.

All MI6 officers get extensive training before they are allowed out on to the streets. Much of this takes place at Fort Monckton near Gosport in Hampshire – a Napoleonic era fortress surrounded by barbed wire and accessible only by a drawbridge.

It includes instruction in basic entry and exit procedures – buildings and cars mainly. If you ever get locked out of your flat and know a friendly spook from school or university give them a ring.

They should be able to get you back inside and could save you a fortune on locksmith’s fees. The instruction also includes some counter-surveillance techniques – how to make sure you are not followed.

And instruction on what to do if you fall into the wrong hands – resistance to interrogation and crucially, what to do if you are restrained – tied or chained up.

It is possible Williams had some of this training and it might well account for the episode when he was discovered tied up in his room by his landlady.

That the sex game angle was a simple smear is a view certainly not ruled out by the Westminster coroner who said, “it is still a legitimate line of inquiry” Gareth died at the hands of MI6.

In her narrative verdict, Dr Fiona Wilcox said: “I am sure a third party placed the bag into the bath and on the balance of probabilities locked the bag.

The cause of death was unnatural and likely to have been criminally mediated. I am therefore satisfied that on the balance of probabilities Gareth was killed unlawfully.”

I was impressed by Dr Wilcox. She had good judgment and wisdom as can be seen from her verdict in the case. She played down the bondage question and the interest in female fashion – Williams had an expensive collection of women’s clothing nearly all of it unworn and most of it not in his size.

She seemed to accept the view of Williams’s sister that these were a store of presents for his female acquaintances. Dr Wilcox pretty much dismissed the idea of any sexual component in his death.

Sadly that is the aspect many people will remember. Well, these kinky games with yourself or other people go wrong – what can you expect – becomes the prevailing attitude.

Occasionally the dark arts of postmortem reputation trashing are employed in a good cause and based on hard facts rather than a set-up.

The strange and squalid habits of Osama bin Laden before his death have been used to great effect by the US to make him a laughing stock.

Crispin Black’s espionage thriller The Falklands Intercept is published by Gibson Square on June 19.

Scotland Yard investigates transvestite smear against spy Gareth, but no disciplinary action will be taken

Victim: Gareth Williams was found locked inside a holdall at his home

Daily Mail | May 5, 2012

Detectives have investigated allegations that police smeared MI6 spy Gareth Williams – but have ruled out taking disciplinary action against any officer.

Scotland Yard’s internal investigation unit examined claims that officers leaked information which led to false media reports that Gareth Williams was a transvestite who was the victim of a sex game that went wrong.

The leaks shifted attention from the spy’s work with MI6 and GCHQ, the Government’s secret listening station, to his private life.

Last night, the Met confirmed its team had ruled out disciplining any officer over the leaks.

In 2010, Mr Williams’s family complained to officers they were learning more about the investigation from newspaper reports rather than from police briefings.

Coroner says British secret service worker was probably “killed unlawfully”

Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire, who is leading the investigation into Mr Williams’s death, told his inquest last week that the leaks diverted resources from genuine lines of inquiry.

The spy’s body was found on August 23, 2010, locked inside a holdall which was placed in the bath at his home in Pimlico, Central London. The victim had last been seen by his colleagues ten days earlier.

Last week, coroner Dr Fiona Wilcox questioned the motives of those who leaked details about Mr Williams’s private life, including his visits to bondage websites. His family say the visits could have been work-related.

Dr Wilcox said Mr Williams was not a transvestite and that his collection of £20,000 of unworn women’s clothes were probably gifts for friends.

She also dismissed claims that Mr Williams had entered the sports bag seeking sexual gratification.

The coroner said: ‘I wonder what the motive was for the release of this material to the media. I wonder whether this was an attempt by a third party to intimate a sexual motive.’

Scotland Yard’s internal investigations unit was asked to look at the leaks after concerns were expressed by Det Chief Insp Sebire.

A Metropolitan Police spokesman said: ‘Concerns were raised that information relating to the investigation had been placed in the public domain.

The force initiated an exercise to assess the concerns. A decision was taken not to proceed further.’

Police wasted time on false leads generated by the leaks. Reports that Mr Williams went to gay bars in the Vauxhall area of London, and visited websites on sadomasochism and claustrophilia – the sexual pleasure of confined spaces – proved to be false.

Det Chief Insp Sebire told the inquest that she had seen at first-hand the
distress the leaks had caused the Williams family, but insisted: ‘They did not come from my team.’

A senior police source said that suspicions surrounding the source of the leaks initially centred on counter-terrorism police officers and MI6.

Last night a Whitehall spokesman denied MI6 was responsible for the smears but declined to say whether the Service was also investigating the claims.

A memo released to the inquest revealed that senior officials at GCHQ, where Mr Williams spent most of his career, were concerned about the leaks.

Last night, a GCHQ spokesman declined to comment on the memo or any investigation into the leaks.

MI6 and GCHQ were criticised by the coroner for waiting more than a week before raising the alarm about Mr Williams’s absence.

Dr Wilcox also hit out at counter-terrorism officers who liaised with MI6 and GCHQ, and police officers investigating the spy’s death.

She said evidence that could have helped the inquiry was only passed to detectives once the inquest was in its second week.

Last week it was revealed that police are planning to take DNA samples from up to 50 spies.

Dr Wilcox said the possibility that another spy was involved in Mr Williams’s death was a ‘legitimate line
of inquiry’.

At the end of the inquest, Mr Williams’s family criticised SO15, the Met’s counter-terrorism branch, for the ‘total inadequacies’ of its investigation into MI6.

The family said: ‘Our grief is exacerbated by the failure of MI6 to make even the most basic inquiries as to Gareth’s whereabouts and welfare.

‘We are also extremely disappointed at the reluctance and failure of MI6 to make available relevant information.’

Another way to kill US farmers: Seize their bank accounts on phony charges

Food Freedom News | Apr 23, 2012

By Rady Ananda

Monsanto’s Food and Drug Administration can’t close down small dairies and private food clubs fast enough, bursting on the scene with guns drawn as if the criminalized right to contract for natural foods we’ve consumed for millennia deserves SWAT attention.

Now, Obama has the Dept. of Justice going after small farmers under the post-911 “Bank Secrecy Act” which makes it a crime to deposit less than $10,000 when you earned more than that.

“The level we deposited was what it was and it was about the same every week,” Randy Sowers told Frederick News. The Sowers own and run South Mountain Creamery in Middletown, Maryland.

Admittedly, when the Sowers earned over $10,000 in February, and learned they’d have to fill out paperwork at the bank for such large deposits, they simply rolled the deposits over to keep them below the none-of-your-fucking-business amount, rather than waste time on bureaucratic red tape aimed at flagging terrorism or other illegal activities.

“Structuring,” explains Overlawyered.com, “is the federal criminal offense of splitting up bank deposits so as to keep them under a threshold such as $10,000 above which banks have to report transactions to the government.”

While being questioned, the Sowers were finally presented with a seizure order and advised that the feds had already emptied their bank account of $70,000.  The Dept. of Justice has since sued to keep $63,000 of the Sowers’ money, though they committed no crime other than maintaining their privacy.

Without funds, they will be unable to make purchases for the spring planting.

When a similar action was taken against Taylor’s Produce Stand last year, the feds seized $90,000, dropped the charges, and kept $45,000 of Taylor’s money.

Knowing that most farms operate on a very thin margin, such abuse of power wipes out a family’s income, and for a bonus, the feds enhance the monopoly power of Monsanto, Big Dairy and their supply chain.

You can just smell attorney Michael Taylor behind all this, Obama’s dairy dog.  Who you’ll find, instead, is US district attorney Stefan Cassella. He’s the first to head the DOJ’s Asset Forfeiture & Money Laundering Section, created in 2009, having wrote the books on it. He cut his teeth on seizing $1.2 billion from real money launderer, BCCI.  Guess his focus has changed since then.

The Maryland Dept. of Agriculture had no trouble hitting up the Sowers for a recipe in its Buy-Local cookbook; but Cassella must’ve missed that public service, or it’s what drew his attention – “Ah! A small dairy! Let’s rob them of their cash, those evil Big Dairy competitors. They probably sell raw milk under the table. Even if we find no evidence of wrongdoing, we’ll keep their money anyway.” (Cue Curly’s, “yuh, yuh, yuh.”)

City Paper reports that in 2011, “Maryland brought 14 of the nation’s 99 structuring cases, making it the top state for such prosecutions.  Nationally, the numbers have been rising; the 2011 figures are up 8.8 percent from the year before and up 57.1 percent from five years ago.”

Funny, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, and other criminal banksters are still in operation, despite committing millions of acts of fraud during mortgage reassignations. But the DOJ prioritizes squashing family farmers since it’s easier to pick the low-hanging fruit than do battle with well-financed criminals who’ve illegally seized the homes of millions of US citizens.

Former Maryland assistant U.S. attorney Steven Levin told the paper, “The emphasis is on basically seizing money, whether it is legally or illegally earned. It can lead to financial ruin for business owners, and there’s a potential for abuse here by the government.”

Ya think?

The Bank Secrecy Act was modified* after 9/11, another in a long line of Constitutionally-abhorrent laws enacted by officials who cannot prove they were elected to office (given those elections were held on electronic voting systems that can be hacked without leaving evidence of the crime).

With the current Administration’s Agenda 21 focus on destroying the natural food and herb industry, is it not unsurprising to see unconstitutional terrorist legislation used on innocent, law abiding citizens?

Is there a drone in your neighbourhood? Rise of spy planes exposed after FAA is forced to reveal 63 launch sites across U.S.

Exposed: Location of sites where licences have been granted for the use of drones within the U.S. There are 63 active sites based in 20 states. Red flags show active sites and blue show those locations where licences have expired since 2006

Unmanned spy planes are being launched from locations in 20 states and owners include the military and universities

Daily Mail | Apr 24, 2012

By Julian Gavaghan

There are at least 63 active drone sites around the U.S, federal authorities have been forced to reveal following a landmark Freedom of Information lawsuit.

The unmanned planes – some of which may have been designed to kill terror suspects – are being launched from locations in 20 states.

Most of the active drones are deployed from military installations, enforcement agencies and border patrol teams, according to the Federal Aviation Authority.

But, astonishingly, 19 universities and colleges are also registered as owners of what are officially known as unmanned aerial vehicles.

It is thought that many of institutions, which include Cornell, the University of Colorado, Georgia Tech, and Eastern Gateway Community College, are developing drone technology.

There are also 21 mainstream manufactures, such as General Atomics, who are registered to use drones domestically.

As well as active locations, the FAA also revealed 16 sites where licences to use spy planes have expired and four where authorisations have been disapproved, such as Otter Tail County, Minnesota.

The authority revealed the information after a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Its website hosts an interactive map that allows the user to zoom in to the area around where they live to see if any sites are nearby.

However, the FAA is yet to reveal what kinds of drones might be based at any of these locations.

The agency says it will release this data later.

Most of the drones are likely to be small craft, such as the Draganflyer X8, which can carry a payload of only 2.2lb.

Police, border patrols and environmental agencies, such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), could use for them effectively.

While few would object to vast open areas being monitored for wildfires, there are fears of privacy violations if drones are used to spy over cities.

Other drones – likely to be operated only by the armed forces – might include the MQ-9 Reaper and the MQ-1 Predator, which was used to kill American Al Qaeda boss Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen last September.

The FAA released two lists of public and private entities that have applied for authorisations to fly drones domestically.

Certificates of Authorizations (COAs), issued to public entities like police departments, are active in 42 locations, expired in 16 and disapproved in four.

Special Airworthiness Certificates (SACs), issued to private drone manufacturers, are active in 21 locations and not active in 17.

Among the other unanswered questions, however, are is exactly how many drones each registered user owns.

Watching you: Most of the drones are likely to be small craft, such as the Draganflyer X8, which can carry a payload of only 2.2lb. Police, border patrols and environmental agencies, such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), could use for them effectively

The FAA has confirmed that there were about 300 active COAs and that the agency has issued about 700-750 authorizations since the program began in 2006.

But this information does not reveal how many are owned, for example, by Miami Dade Police Department.

While the use of drones in the U.S. is little known, American operations overseas have been well documented.

As well as high-profile terrorists, campaigners claim hundreds of innocent civilians have been killed in the border regions of Pakistan, where they are most active.

SO WHICH PUBLIC ENTITIES ARE REGISTERED OWNERS OF DRONES? FULL LIST REVEALED HERE

U.S. Air Force

U.S. Army

U.S. Navy

USMC (United States Marine Corps)

DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency)

Department of Agriculture

DHS (Department of Homeland Security) / CBP (Customs and Border Protection)

DHS (Department of Homeland Security) / Science and Technology

DOE (Department of Energy) – Idaho National Laboratory

Department of the Interior

FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation)

NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration)

Washington State Department of Transportation

Mississippi Department of Marine Resources

City of Herington, Kansas

City of North Little Rock, AR Police Department

Arlington Police Department

Miami-Dade Police Department

Ogden Police Department

Seattle Police Dept

Orange County Sheriff’s Office

Polk County Sheriff’s Office

Mesa County Sheriff’s Office

Texas A&M University

Ohio University

Eastern Gateway Community College

University of Alaska Fairbanks

New Mexico Tech

Texas State University

Mississippi State University

University of Colorado

University of Connecticut

Gadsden Police Department

Georgia Tech Research Institute

University of Florida

New Mexico State University

Kansas State University

University of North Dakota

Utah State University

Middle Tennessee State University

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

 

British MI6 officer executed by secret agents specialising in the “dark arts”

Ceri Subbe, the sister of British MI6 agent Gareth Williams, leaves Westminster Coroner’s Court with her husband Chris Subbe, in central London April 23, 2012. On the first day of the inquest into the death of Williams, Ceri Subbe spoke of how he had complained of office tensions and of London’s “rat race” shortly before he met his macabre death. The naked decomposing corpse of Williams was found inside a red bag in a bath at his flat, near the headquarters of Britain’s external intelligence service MI6, in central London on August 25, 2010. Reuters

Updates

Spy found dead in a holdall ‘was being followed in weeks before he was killed’

Relatives demand answers into spy’s ‘dark arts murder’

Body in bag spy Gareth Williams ‘hated London and wanted to leave MI6’

Secret meeting between MI6 and police hours after discovery of spy Gareth Williams’s death

MI6 spy found dead in a bag ‘disliked the office culture, post-work drinks, flash car competitions’ and dreamed of escaping the rat race, sister tells inquest

Dirty tricks may mean killers will never face justice

independent.co.uk | Mar 31, 2012

by Kim Sengupta

An MI6 officer whose body was found in a holdall may have been executed by secret agents specialising in the “dark arts”, with a cover-up subsequently organised to ensure that his killers did not face justice, a court heard yesterday.

The highly charged allegations came at a coroner’s hearing which was also told it was virtually impossible for Gareth Williams to have locked himself inside the bag, but that the hunt for those who may have killed him was sidetracked by a major forensic blunder.

The mix-up, over DNA found on the body, was discovered only two weeks ago – while the investigation into one of the most high-profile spy cases of recent times has been going up a blind alley for the best part of a year.

Westminster Coroner’s Court in London was also told that MI6 (the Secret Intelligence Service) had not checked on Mr Williams’s whereabouts for more than a week, even though he had failed to turn up for work. As a result, his remains were so decomposed and contaminated that scientists had been unable to ascertain the cause of death.

Anthony O’Toole, representing Mr Williams’s relations, told the court: “The impression of the family is that the unknown third party was a member of some agency specialising in the dark arts of the secret services – or evidence has been removed post mortem by experts in the dark arts.”

Mr O’Toole said Mr Williams “could have been actively deployed” as an agent up to five months before his death. There was a “bland statement” from MI6 “that the death was nothing to do with his work”, said the lawyer. “To properly explore the circumstances of the death, we need to establish the deceased’s work,” he added.

 

Mr Williams worked as a cipher and codes expert for GCHQ, the Government listening station, but had been on secondment with MI6 since March 2010. His body was found at his flat in Pimlico, south-west London, in August 2010 in a North Face holdall sealed by a padlock.

Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire told the court that traces of DNA found on one of Mr Williams’s hands were previously been regarded as a “key line of inquiry”. But it subsequently emerged that “actually the DNA evidence was contamination by a scientist at the scene”.

The laboratory responsible, LGC Forensics, last night apologised to Mr Williams’s family. “LGC identified the partial profile as matching that of a Metropolitan Police scientist who was involved in the original investigation,” a spokeswoman for the company said.

The coroner, Dr Fiona Wilcox, said: “What I am concerned about is that there is a system in placed to detect the error. Human errors will always occur.

“There has been so much public speculation and so much public anxiety that this is the reason the court has to act to address it.”

Mr Williams’s family, said Mr O’Toole, was concerned a third party who may have been present at his death has still not been traced. There was the DNA evidence which turned out to be contaminated and also, supposedly, a footprint. But both leads had come to “dead ends”.

Examination of a door knob which may have provided incriminating material could not be carried out because the expert tasked with doing so found the door had been removed and the knob taken out, said the lawyer.

The inquest into Mr Williams’s death, expected to begin in April, will hear from his colleagues at MI6 (who will give evidence anonymously) and GCHQ, toxicology experts, bag experts, as well as from his sister. It will also hear that he may have died after breathing too much carbon dioxide.

Dr Wilcox said she wanted the circumstances of Mr Williams’s death to be re-enacted in court. “I want it demonstrated in court how somebody could have got into the bag, done it up and locked it from outside when confined inside. It’s the fundamental issue in this case: whether Gareth Williams was able to lock the bag when he was inside.”

But Vincent Williams, representing Scotland Yard, held there was no need for such a demonstration. A panel of experts had concluded it “would have been very difficult, if not impossible” for him to lock the bag from the inside.

Timeline: The mysterious death of Gareth Williams

15 Aug 2010

31-year-old Gareth Williams, a cipher and codes expert who worked at the GCHQ listening post in Cheltenham, is seen alive for the last time.

23 Aug 2010

A colleague at GCHQ reports Williams missing. His body is found later that day at his flat in Pimlico, London.

30 Aug 2010

Detectives say they are looking at whether Williams may have been killed by a foreign intelligence agency.

1 Sept 2010

An inquest hears that Williams’s remains were discovered padlocked into a sports bag, which was in an empty bath at his flat.

6 Sept 2010

Police appeal for help in tracing a couple of Mediterranean appearance, pictured left, who were seen entering Williams’s flat earlier in the summer.

22 Dec 2010

Police reveal that Williams had accessed bondage websites and visited a drag show, amid suggestions that the death could have been the result of a sex game gone wrong.

March 2012

After 18 months of investigation, police discover that a trace of DNA found on Williams’s hand came from a crime scene scientist. They also find that the couple they were tracing were irrelevant to the inquiry.

JFK’s mistress assassinated by the CIA ‘because she knew too much about his assassination’

Murder: Ms Meyer, center, was shot dead by a Georgetown canal in October 1964, and while police said it was a would-be sexual assault that turned fatal, a new book- and her ex- claims she was assassinated by the CIA

Daily Mail | Apr 20, 2012

The suspicious death of one of President John F. Kennedy’s mistresses just months after his death has sparked numerous conspiracy theories.

The latest version posits that socialite Mary Pinchot Meyer, a beautiful divorcee who was close friends with the Kennedys and is widely known for having a lengthy affair with the playboy President, was shot in a cover-up operation by the CIA.

A new book alleges that, in her preoccupation with her lover’s assassination and ensuing personal investigation, she may have gotten so close to the ‘truth’ that the CIA found her to be a threat.

As a result, agency operatives staged a shooting to make it look like she died due to a sexual assault that turned violent.

Whether or not the theory is true, there are a number of questionable components to the story of the months leading up to her death on October 12, 1964.

Her ex-husband, Cord Meyer, was a CIA agent himself and the couple were card-carrying members of Georgetown’s starry social set, which included then-Senator John F. Kennedy and his wife Jacqueline.

The couples became close friends, along with Mary’s sister Antoinette (who went by Tony) and her husband Ben Bradlee, who was a bureau chief for Newsweek but later went on to be the managing editor of The Washington Post.

Mary Pinchot Meyer Book Suggests JFK Did LSD, Assassinated by CIA

Mary Pinchot Meyer, JFK Mistress, Assassinated By CIA, New Book Says

Another couple that they spent time with was Mary’s Vassar classmate Cicely d’Autremont and her husband James Angleton, who was the chief of the counter surveillance for the CIA.

A book by Peter Janney, called Mary’s Mosaic: The CIA Conspiracy to Murder John F. Kennedy, Mary Pinchot Meyer, and Their Vision of World Peace, the author claims that the the socialite would often bring marijuana and LSD to her trysts with the President.

During their conversations while on these hallucinogens, Ms Pinchot Meyer reportedly tried to appeal to Mr Kennedy’s pacifist nature and urged him to seek peaceful solutions to such worldwide crises like the Cold War and the Cuban missile crisis.

At the time, LSD was not illegal, and many, including Harvard professor Timothy Leary, advocated its use because they believed it helped people expand their knowledge base.

Mr Janney’s book is not the first to draw conclusions between Ms Pinchot Meyer’s friendship with Mr Leary and her intentions with her relationship with Mr Kennedy.

He goes on to say that she was later murdered by the CIA, who he believes organized the assassination of the President in an effort to stop him from preventing violent escalation that they wanted in the Cold War.

Though The Huffington Post thought that the book rested largely on substantial assumptions, these theories have been in existence for some time.

One question lies in the existence- and retrieval- of her diary that included writings about her affair with President Kennedy.

Within a day of her murder, Mr Bradlee went over to her home to find the diary and, though the door was locked, he found Mr Angleton.

The CIA spymaster said that he also was looking for the diary but claimed that it was because his wife- Ms Meyer’s friend- had asked him to.

The whereabouts of the diary today are uncertain.

Another clue erring on the side of the conspiracy is that while her ex-husband included a statement of support for the police investigation of her murder, his assistant supposedly said that it was a lie and he did truly believe it to be a standard ‘in house rub out’.

In an interview shortly before his death in 2001, Mr Meyer said that ‘the same sons of b****es that killed John F. Kennedy’ killed his ex-wife.

Police arrested Robert Crump, a man who was found near the scene of the crime, but had no connection to the murder weapon, which was never found, or any prior history with Ms Meyer.

Cellphone crackdown by panhandling ‘homeless’ cops to expand

An Ottawa police officer disguised as a panhandler helps catch drivers texting behind the wheel Thursday, April 19, 2012.

ottawa.ctv.ca | Apr 19, 2012

Ottawa police are using an unconventional method to crack down on drivers using handheld devices behind the wheel.

Officers have been patrolling intersections dressed as panhandlers to catch unsuspecting drivers as they break the law by using their phones.

“I mimic panhandling at the corner,” said Cst. Dan Jesty. “It gets me in close to the vehicles. I can look inside to see if they’re talking on a cell phone or texting on a cell phone.”

Part of the costume is a cardboard sign. Instead of asking for change though, the sign identifies the officer as a member of the police force.

Once the disguised officer catches a distracted driver, they radio partners in nearby patrol cars who then pull the driver over.

“If you have a police officer standing in full uniform and a cruiser well you’d probably never pick up a person,” said Jesty. “Blend in with the public, people feel at ease and the first thing they do is pick up that cell phone.”

Panhandling cop has surprise message for B.C. drivers

Cellphone crackdown by ‘panhandling’ officer to expand

Drivers who were stopped in the operation had mixed reactions to the disguise.

“All I can say is it is clever,” said driver Daniel Lachance. “I can’t say anything else. They caught me. There it is. And here I am.”

Others though were angered by the tactic. Allison Boyles said she was frightened when someone who she thought was a stranger approached her vehicle.

“In that moment, I reached for my phone hoping that sends a message to somebody approaching my vehicle,” she said.

Boyles plans on disputing her ticket in court.

Ottawa police have caught 97 people for distracted driving since they began the undercover campaign on Monday. They’ve also issued 18 tickets for seatbelt violations.