Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Gaza, Guantanamo, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Prosecution of the Bush Administration, Supreme Court, Surveillance, Targeting Muslims, Torture, Truth to Power, War Resister
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Ten Year Anniversary of Guantanamo Bay Prison
Co-host Michael Ratner and president emeritus of the Center for Constitutional Rights gives listeners an overview of the habeas corpus legal battles to close Guantanamo Bay prison and an in depth look at the corrosive effect the offshore prison has had on civil rights, and the U.S. Constitution. Despite the fact that the U.S. government has itself cleared more than half of these men for release, and despite President Obama’s promise on his second day in office to close Guantánamo within a year, it has been almost twelve months since anyone has been released.
This is the longest period of time that has elapsed since the prison’s opening without a single person being set free.The Obama administration has also extended some of the worst aspects of the Guantánamo system by continuing indefinite detentions without charge or trial, employing illegitimate military commissions to try some suspects, and blocking accountability for torture.
—-
International People’s Tribunal on “War Crimes and Other Violations of International Law
International People’s Tribunal on “War Crimes and Other Violations of International Law” to be held on January 14, 2012 at 12 pm at Columbia Law School. The event will provide an excellent opportunity for students interested in gaining an understanding the theory and the practical application of international law in the real world.
Attorney Roger Wareham:
- The genesis of the tribunal began during the intervention in Libya.
- Back in May the December 12th movement always has a celebration of Malcolm X’s birthday, May 19.
- This is part an ongoing campaign to re-colonize the African continent.
- Libya was important to that for a number reasons. Libya has some of the best crude oil in the world that requires the least amount of production in terms of transforming it into gasoline.
- Col. Gaddafi stood for the proposition that there would be a United States of Africa.
- Libya had the highest standard of living on the African continent.
- What we hope to come out of this is fashion a petition to take before the International Criminal Court.
- The plan is we’ll going to take at least a 400 people strong delegation to the Hague in June to present a petition to the prosecutor, requesting they prosecute the heads of NATO, Britain, Canada, Italy, for war crimes.
- Saturday January 14, 2012 / Columbia University Law School / 435 West 116th Street / 718-398-1766 / iptribunal2012@gmail.com
Guest – Roger Wareham, lawyer and political activist of over four decades. He is a member of the December 12th Movement, an organization of African people which organizes in the Black and Latino community around human rights violations, particularly police terror. Wareham is also the International Secretary-General of the International Association Against Torture (AICT), a non-governmental organization that has consultative status before the United Nations.
—-
Cornell and The Technion of Israel To Build Campus On Governor’s Island
As many listeners may know, Cornell University is joining with Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in a plan to build a campus in New York City. Critics however, point out Technion’s involvement with the Israeli Defense Force in the development of repressive technology that would further perpetuate crimes against Palestinians. Through cooperative research with Israeli defense companies such as Elbit, Rafael, McGill and Concordia, Technion is involved in asymmetrical robotic warfare with faceless human targets who can be killed by remote control.
To talk more about this, we’re joined today by David Klein, a professor at California State University in Northridge and a member of the Organizing Committee of the U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.
Professor David Klein:
- It is a collaboration between Cornell University and Technion which is like Israel’s MIT.
- There’s a 350 million dollar grant from a philanthropist, which has been supplemented with 100 million dollars in public money.
- I’m a member of the Organizing Committee of the U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.
- The demands that we have are ending the occupation and colonization all Arab lands and dismantling the apartheid wall.
- Recognizing the fundamental rights of Arab / Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality.
- Respecting and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and property as stipulated in UN resolution 194.
- Technion is deeply complicit with Israel’s military and provides the military with technology to carry out ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
- Participants in a joint military and university program for science students, who will later be integrated into the Army’s research and development units, wear uniforms throughout their years of study.
- It’s particularly strong in developing robotic weapons systems, which include aerial drones, and unmanned combat vehicle technology.
- I think Bloomberg is supportive of the apartheid system in Israel. He wouldn’t view this as a problem like much of the rest of the world does.
- The crime of apartheid is an international crime against humanity.
- In addition to aerial drones, Technion makes the Black D9 Bulldozer, it makes the Stealth UVA Drone, which is a drone that can fly almost 3000km without refueling.
- It’s making something called the Dragonfly UVA mini-drone, which is a tiny drone with a 9 inch wingspan. It can fly into people’s bedroom windows and kill em.
- Technion is involved in asymmetrical robotic warfare with faceless human targets who can be killed by remote control.
- Israel is arguably the most racist country at this time, due to the apartheid system that it has.
Guest – David Klein, member of the Organizing Committee of the U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (www.usacbi.org), and is a professor of mathematics at California State University, Northridge (CSUN). He received his Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from Cornell University. His professional interests include mathematical physics, climate science, and mathematics education in the public schools. He is the faculty advisor for the campus student groups, Students for Justice in Palestine and the CSUN Green Party. David Klein’s website
——
CCR Lawsuit: Stop and Frisk NYC
Last year, a federal judge rejected a move by the City of New York to stop a lawsuit filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights challenging the New York City Police Department’s Stop and Frisk policy. Judge Shir Scheindlin pointed out the seriousness of numerous claims that the NYPD disproportionately and illegally targeting communities of color. In 2009 New York City, a record 576,394 people were stopped, 84 percent of whom were Black and Latino residents — although they comprise only about 26 percent and 27 percent of New York City’s total population respectively. The year 2009 was not an anomaly. Ten years of raw data obtained by court order from the New York City Police Department (NYPD) show that stop-and-frisks result in a minimal yield of weapons and contraband.
Attorney Darius Charney:
- Stop and Frisk is a city wide epidemic. We’ve gone from 90 thousand in 2002 to 700 thousand this year. They’re stopping 2000 people a day, primarily young males of color but also females of color.
- There are really know criteria as far as we can tell. There are guidelines that have been laid out by the courts in the last forty years. The police don’t follow those guidelines. They’re suppose to reasonable suspicion of criminal activity.
- They’re stopping people for what’s called “furtive movements” whatever that means.
- The other one is “high crime neighborhood.” The court had ruled that this is unconstitional, you can’t use the basis of a high crime neighborhood to stop and search them.
- Yet again, the police are doing that hundreds of thousands of times a year.
- The two allegations we made is that the NYPD has a widespread policy and practice of stopping and frisking New Yorkers without reasonable suspicion which violates the fourth Amendment of the Constitution and then on the basis of race which violates the Equal Protection clause of the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.
- The blacker or browner that neighborhood is, the more stops that are going to be done in that neighborhood.
- The other part is the weapon recovery rate, the police department justifies this program by saying, we’re trying to get guns off the street.
- Last year in 2010, they stopped over 600 thousand people. The number of guns recovered in those 600 thousand stops was 1200 guns.
- Relief sought in class action suit: Outside independent oversight of the police department.
Guest – Darius Charney, senior staff attorney in the Racial Justice/Government Misconduct Docket. He is currently lead counsel on Floyd v. City of New York, a federal civil rights class action lawsuit challenging the New York Police Department’s unconstitutional and racially discriminatory stop-and-frisk practices, and Vulcan Society Inc. v. the City of New York, a Title VII class action lawsuit on behalf of African-American applicants to the New York City Fire Department which challenges the racially discriminatory hiring practices of the FDNY.
——————————————-
Afghanistan War, Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Targeting Muslims, Truth to Power
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Updates:
- Michael Smith: Obama Balance Sheet 2011
—
Year End Look Back 2011 – Jim Lafferty
Looking back on 2011, amid the colossal economic failure and compounded erosion of civil liberties, there were slivers of bright light to note, such as the wonderful activism and momentum of the Occupy Wall Street movement. The subsequent pulling together of activists, unions and lawyers marked this year in launching the foundation of a vital movement. Will this emerging movement continue to build and hold together to counter and restructure a corrupt and crumbling edifice of democracy?
Attorney Jim Lafferty:
- I’m now 73, I’ve not been as excited and optimistic about a movement since the sixties as I am around the occupation movement.
- It’s very exciting, it’s very broad and a lot deeper than the 1 percent would like to acknowledge.
- We don’t have a great sense of history in this country, we certainly don’t learn it in our high schools.
- Many of the young people that are at the heart and soul of this new movement are not the beneficiaries of a historical context of which to organize ourselves.
- It’s proven that you don’t need that to make a splash.
- When you go to the heart of capitalism itself which is what this movement does, its not surprising that they were met with fierce and brutal police reaction.
- They were ignored by the press in the first week or two, much of the press has been a distortion of it since.
- Reading the picket signs alone would tell you damn well what they want.
- This is an economic injustice movement. Capitalism can’t produce the type of economic justice that these tens of thousands are demanding.
- When Bonnie and I were arrested in New York at OWS, we even had cops saying to us, we’re part of the 99 percent.
- People aren’t making it and can’t make it in this country given the skewed and unjust economic system that capitalism represents.
- The US Census Bureau acknowledges that 100 million people are living in poverty or are in danger of slipping into poverty.
- When a presidential election cycle comes up, anti-war movements, civil rights movements, womens’ rights movements, tend to leave the streets.
- Don’t fall for the trap of electoral politics.
- Phase 2: I don’t know if that (encampments) are a sustainable way of operating a movement in this country.
- Here in L.A., one of the unions SIEU offered an indoor space to the movement where they can organize.
- Last week we shut down a number of home foreclosure auction sales.
Guest – Jim Lafferty, Executive director of the National Lawyers Guild in Los Angeles and host of The Lawyers Guild Show on Pacifica’s KPFK 90. 7 FM to reflect back on 2011 and a look ahead.
——-
Occupy Wall St and the Brecht Forum
Kazembe Balagun, an activist and cultural organizer from the Bronx discusses the activism within the Occupy Wall Street movement through the Education and Empowerment Committee. Kazembe is also the program director at the Brecht Forum.
Kazembe Balagun:
- When I went down to Zuccotti, what I found was a vibrant community that had already started.
- It did really speak to the frustration of the current economic and political climate.
- As a public educator at the Brecht Forum you want to provide a context for these demonstrations.
- You want to have a conversation with them, in that this is not the first time this happened.
- We brought our comrade, Rick Wolff down there, and had a talk with almost 300 people. All great movements have great literacies.
- We have a movement where people are not only learning to speak in public but we’re all listening to each other.
- Wall Street has been the site of oppression for all people. Primarily because the wall that was built outside Wall Street was built to keep the Native Americans outside the business district.
- Black and brown communities have been the hardest hit in terms of foreclosure rates, stop and frisk. So what we have now is Occupy the Bronx, Occupy Sunset Park.
- We can occupy ourselves, that we can step into a new way of public life.
Guest – Kazembe Balagun, program director at the Brecht Forum.
——
Unrelenting Global Economic Crisis: A Doomsday View of 2012
Continuing the look back and now ahead to 2012, we’re glad to have back with us, Jim Petras, author and former Professor of Sociology at Binghamton University, New York to discuss his latest article published on Global Research Unrelenting Global Economic Crisis: A Doomsday View of 2012. In this article Petras enumerates key events that will inevitably shape the next 12 months. He starts with – The Collapse of the European Union, then the recession deepens in United States, new wars erupt in the midst of this crisis.
These events, will lead to coming wars that will end America as we know it, meanwhile Europe sinks deep into austerity and class warfare intensifies. Petras says, that in response mass movements will continue to build, recede and re-emerge. Protests and rebellions, social revolutions and political power across the globe will be important catalysts.
Jim Petras:
- The economy has never really recovered from the recession. All the trends from the early Spring have been on the negative side. Instead of take off in 2012, we see the opposite taking place, slow down in investment, slow down in overall exports, slow down in financing the employment.
- What we do see is a big profit for the speculators. The speculators are back with a vengence. Carlyle has reported over 12 billion dollars in profits for the first 11 months.
- The speculators are working, the housing market is terrible.
- The debt has skyrocketed so much, so much was thrown at the bank bailouts, that there arent’ enough resources to pull us out of this recession.
- The Democrats are making deals with the Republicans to actually cut back on federal spending because of the deficit. I see us moving into recession by the end of Spring and heading toward worse a depression by the end of the year.
- This is all going to be exacerbated by a move toward a war with Iran, which will push oil prices up over 150 USD/barrel. The powers that are moving toward that war particularly, the Zionist power configuration.
- The consequences will be very very catastrophic for the economy of the United States.
- Speculators are back in power, the housing market is negative, the job employment is negative, 2011 trends are moving down toward recession, I don’t see any counter moves.
- Cumulative debt payments are negative, I don’t see any possibility of a injection of major public spending of which would turn this around or at least ameliorate it. Keep it at zero growth.
- Keep us at stagnation, rather then negative territory.
- Obama did nothing to stimulate a new structure in America which could take government support and move forward. What he did is pour the money into the people who caused the crisis on Wall Street.
- After Obama gets elected you’re going to see the most horrendous attack on the social security programs, medicaid, medicare. He’s holding back because he wants to get elected.
- He’s looking to slash and burn the only social programs that sustain American living standards for millions of workers who paid into this fund.
- This isn’t an entitlement program, this social insurance that has been paid for by American workers.
- He’s going to go into Iran, because he told the reformed Jews, all options are on the table, and he stationed an armada of Air Force smack facing Tehran. That’s a move toward war.
- Read Netanyahu and Barack, the defense minister of Israel and the Prime Minister of Israel, then the message gets transmitted to the New York Times, then it gets transmitted to Washington, you get a third hand.
- Why not look at the press releases coming out of Tel Aviv, if you want to know what tomorrow’s news is going to be.
- I think we’re going to see something new coming out of this great discontent.
Guest – James Petras, author and former Professor of Sociology at Binghamton University, New York.
Civil Liberties, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Prison Industry, Surveillance, Targeting Muslims, Torture, Truth to Power
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Updates:
—-
National Defense Authorization Act Update
Co-host Michael Ratner expounds on National Defense Authorization Act. The Act has passed both houses, despite Obama threatening to veto the Act. Obama thought that various provisions of the National Defense Authorization Act concerning detentions, might impinge on his authority as the executive. Obama was more concerned about Congress telling the President how to treat those captured or kidnapped in “war on terror.”
—-
UPDATE: Political Prisoner Lynne Stewart
Political prisoner and good friend, Lynne Stewart continues to uplift people around her while serving a 10 year sentence at the Federal Medical Center in Fort Worth Texas. Lynne, as many listeners know, was prosecuted for representing her client the blind Egyptian Sheik, Omar Abdel Rahman. In trying to negotiate a return to Egypt out of solitary confinement, she made a press release public. She was tried and found guilty for materially aiding “terrorism.” She received a 2 and half year sentence, instead of 30 years that the government wanted. Then, the Second Circuit Court sent the case back to the Judge. Judge John G Koeltl sentenced defendant, Lynne Stewart: 120 months incarceration on five counts to be served concurrently. Lynne Stewart is now 72 years old, she’s a breast cancer survivor with other pending health issues. She’s called them the usual brush fires of aging, yet many are concerned. SAVE THE DATE FEBRUARY 28-29
Ralph Poynter:
- She is looking forward to her attorney Herald Price Fahringer to presenting to the court once again testing the law. We are planning a Occupy the Court Room and the park, the night before on February 28 through to the 29.
- The lawyer will be talking about the laws used to extend Lynne’s sentence. He said any lawyer that wouldn’t want this case, doesn’t understand law. He looked forward to doing it. He went for a one hour visit with Lynne at MCC and stayed all day.
- No matter what happens, Lynne will continue to fight for her license.
- She’s is Federal Medical Center in Fort Worth, Texas. Big airbase there. It’s an enormous prison, but she’s in the hospital ward.
- Even though I’d been on the list visiting her (in New York prison) I was not on the list (Texas prison)
- I just went down there, and she said, you’re not on the list but I’m going to go to floor supervisor and she says, you just come.
- That Saturday morning I was in front of the prison and they told me I was not eligible to go in. They said it was like an airbase, so I walked outside the gate and stood there. The guard came over and said what are doing here? I said, I’m waiting.
- Around 10:30 an official car came down and said you’re denied admission.
- I said, I understand, but I’m going to wait.
- Around Noon, the woman came back and she says, fill out an application.
- She said I knew if you fought from the outside I was going to fight from the inside and it only took 4 hours.
- You can’t imagine after sleeping on a 2 inch exercise mat on a steel platform for a year, and they showed me the hospital bed.
- She is Miss S, in the prison. Everybody brings her their papers.
- She heard noise outside her room at 5 o’clock in the morning, they were lined up some with papers stacked 3 feet high.
- There is an oxymoron – prison health care. There is no such thing.
- She’s lost about 45 pounds.
- She’s very sick, she can’t sit down. In the visiting room she has to sit sideways.
- Thanks again for all of the people sending bucks for me to go see Lynne.
- Write her a letter. The letters pick her up.
- They gave her medicine and she couldn’t get out of bed. We have a system now when they give her medicine she calls me up. I call my daughter the doctor and she tells me whether Lynne should take it or not take it.
Guest – Ralph Poynter, Lynne’s husband, father, activist. Please write to Lynne Stewart – LYNNE STEWART / 53504-054 FMC CARSWELL / FEDERAL MEDICAL CENTER / P.O. BOX 27137 / FORT WORTH, TX 76127
—–
Photo by flickr user G20Voice
Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, FBI Intrusion, Human Rights, Political Prisoner, Prison Industry, Surveillance, Targeting Muslims, Truth to Power
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Updates:
—-
Appeal Denied In Holy Land Foundation Case
Last week, the Fifth Circuit dismissed the appeal for the Holy Land Foundation case. This decision affirmed the conviction of Ghassan Elashi, the co-founder of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development. As many listeners may know, the Holy Land Foundation was considered the largest Muslim charity in the United States before the Bush administration shut it down after the September 11 attacks. In May 2009, a federal judge in Dallas handed down sentences ranging from 15 to 65 years in prison to five of the charity’s founders and former fundraisers. Over a year before, a federal jury returned guilty verdicts on all 108 counts against the Foundation and the five former officers on charges of providing material support to Hamas after the U.S. government designated it a foreign terrorist organization in 1995. During that trial, the prosecution used unrelated video of suicide bombers to emotionally sway the jury.
Ghassan Elashi was then sentenced to 65 years in prison for giving material support in the form of humanitarian aid to Zakat committees – Palestinian charities in the West Bank and Gaza, that prosecutors were alleging were fronts for Hamas. Ghassan is being held in the Communications Management Unit in Marion, Illinois.
Noor Elashi:
- One of the arguments the defense lawyers made is that USAID, which is a government agency sent money to the same exact Zakat Committees which are these distribution centers in Palestine that the Holy Land Foundation sent charity to.
- That was their main charge, they were charged with giving material support in the form of humanitarian aid to Zakat Committees which the prosecutors were claiming were fronts for Hamas.
- In their appeal, one of their main arguments is that these Zakat Committees received money from many NGOs including an American agency.
- Another argument in the appeal was for the first time in US history, an expert witness who was an Israeli intelligence officer who testified under a fake name was allowed to testify under a pseudonym.
- My father recently had a phone call ban, because he put his name on a yoga mat, and it was considered destruction of government property.
- Our defense attorneys are not going to quit. They will ask the entire panel of appellate judges to re-hear the case, if that is denied, they’ll take the case to the Supreme Court.
- The foreign policy and politics of this country have been very favorable to Israel.
- FreedomToGive.com
Guest – Noor Elashi – the daughter of Holy Land Foundation prisoner Ghassan Elashi. She is a writer based in Dallas, Texas. After receiving a Bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of North Texas, she worked for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. In July 2008, she won the 3rd place Mayborn Literary Nonfiction Award for her manuscript titled “Displaced,” which she plans to expand into a memoir about the displacement of three generations of Palestinians: her grandmother, father, and herself. She can be reached at noorelashi@gmail.com.
—–
Event In Philadelphia Marks 30 Years of Mumia Abu-Jamal’s Incarceration
On December 7, the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office announced that it will not seek another death sentence for Mumia Abu-Jamal. Under Pennsylvania law, Mr. Abu-Jamal will now be sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole in the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas. The National Lawyers Guild commented that while there is overwhelming doubt about what the state claims to be the facts in this case, even those allegations never supported a capital charge. That it has taken three decades to remove death from the table is astonishing.
The Guild has long maintained that Mr. Abu-Jamal is entitled to a new and fair trial. Procedural irregularities plagued his case from the outset, including blatant constitutional violations, from the judge allowing the prosecution to admit evidence of his affiliation with the Black Panther Party, in violation of the Supreme Court case Dawson v. Delaware, to the use of a faulty sentencing form that misled jurors during the penalty phase, in violation of the Supreme Court case Mills v. Maryland.
A great deal of relevant evidence has never been reviewed by any court, much less presented to a jury. This evidence includes several photographs of the crime scene which impeach the testimony of a police officer who was a key eyewitness and proof that another individual was present, and fled, the scene of the shooting.
Mr. Abu-Jamal was charged at a time when, it was later revealed, there was extensive corruption within the Philadelphia Police Department. In 1995, then-District Attorney Lynne Abraham promised the city that she would dismiss any case in which there was evidence of police perjury or purposeful misreporting of facts. Given the history of police misconduct in Philadelphia when Abu-Jamal was arrested, and the specific instances of police perjury in his case, the National Lawyers Guild has urged current District Attorney Seth Williams to act on his predecessor’s unfulfilled pledge.
Two days after the DA’s announcement, and commemorating International Human Rights Day, a free forum was held at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia to mark the 30th anniversary of Mumia Abu-Jamal’s incarceration, justice. Twelve-hundred Mumia supporters met to reinvigorate the movement for justice for Abu-Jamal and to say no to life in prison for the political prisoner. “Because for 30 years Abu-Jamal has been unconstitutionally imprisoned in death row torture, justice for Mumia will not be served by life imprisonment, but by freedom,” said Dr. Johanna Fernandez, professor of history at Baruch College of the City University of New York and a co-producer of the forum. Fernandez wrote and produced a documentary, which debuted at the Constitution Center in 2010 on Abu-Jamal’s case. “Justice on Trial: The Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal,” examines evidence pointing to Abu-Jamal’s innocence and exposes the inequities of the American justice system.
Speakers:
The December 9 forum was co-sponsored by Educators for Mumia Abu-Jamal, the National Lawyers Guild and International Family and Friends of Mumia Abu-Jamal.
———————————
Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Human Rights, Surveillance, Truth to Power
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Updates:
—-
Brooklyn Fair Food Festival Urges Trader Joe’s To Support Fair Labor Standards For Farm Workers.
Brooklyn, community members joined the Coalition of Immokalee Workers an organization of farm workers in Southern Florida to call on Trader Joe’s to live up to its public image as an ethical corporation by participating in the Campaign For Fair Food. The Campaign seeks to improve wages and working conditions for Florida tomato pickers by calling on major buyers of tomatoes to pay a premium of one penny more per pound for their tomatoes, ensure that this penny is passed down directly to farmworkers, and work together with the CIW to establish and implement a code of conduct in their supply chains. Sound gathered and interviews by Michael Ratner.
—
Wall Street Firms Spy On Protesters In Tax Funded Center
It was six years in the planning according to recently uncovered documents that show 150 million taxpayer dollars funding a round the clock surveillance security center in Lower Manhattan where Wall Street firms sit along side the NYPD. That’s right, high wage Wall Street firm workers will sit next to MTA, NYPD and Port Authority employees and monitor the near 3000 spy cameras installed in the area. Any individual can be tracked by the color of their clothes or face recognition with live feed cameras that also read license plates. In her article Wall Street Firms Spy on Protesters in Tax-Funded Center, investigative journalist Pam Martens also focused on the corrupt alliance of indicted corporate firms merging with police to spy on law abiding citizens funded by tax payer money. Her latest article in Counterpunch titled Financial Giants Put New York City Cops On Their Payroll exposes how private Wall Street corporations are allowed to order a paid detail of New York City Police at an average of 37.00 an hour. The taxpayer again picks up the tab for training, uniforms and any law suit brought from “following illegal instructions from its corporate master.”
Pam Martens:
- I had the benefit of managing my own client base, so Wall Street did not have the same type of leverage over me that it has over so many of its other workers.
- About 10 years into my tenure, I started reading about the private justice system Wall Street had set up where both customers and employees had to waive their rights to the nation’s courts.
- I started complaining and advocating against that. They were self policing, that was totally corrupt.
- Then I started protesting in the streets, filed a large federal rights action, and testified at several venues, the SEC and the Federal Reserve.
- The story is much more insidious than I first realized. I came across a 60 Minutes expose on the counter-terrorism unit of the NYPD. At the very end of the piece there is a tour of the facility, the one that I’m talking about.
- The Lower Manhattan Security Coordination Center, which is jointly operated by Wall Street’s potential felons and the largest law enforcement police force in the country. It’s actually at 55 Broadway.
- Goldman Sachs and Citigroup, sitting next to public sector employees.
- It consists of 3 rows of computer terminals. 2 of those rows are dominated by Wall Street firms, the NYSE, the Federal Reserve and only one row has uniformed officers.
- I called up the producer at 60 Minutes, and said you had to have seen all these people in civilian clothes.
- The NYPD has used tax payer money to have one massive computer to look at all the individual feeds. That massive computer has artificial intelligence.
- There is absolutely no explanation for why Wall Street firms get to sit there and have access confidential databases that belong to the NYPD. I have 2 FOIA requests with the NYPD. Every detail of us is under surveillance.
- There are some reports, they can zero in and read text messages on your cell phone.
- These Wall Street firms that have committed crime after crime, after crime, they’re currently under 51 separate state and federal investigations for securities fraud and essentially looting the public. They’re the partners, the potential felons, are the partners with the law enforcement.
- Credit Suisse v. Billing, 551 U.S. 264 (2007), was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States, which held that Congress’ creation of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) implicitly exempted the regulated securities industry from antitrust lawsuits under other existing laws. Justice Thomas dissented, arguing that the laws creating the SEC explicitly mention that securities regulations are in addition to, not instead of, existing law.
Guest – Pam Martens worked on Wall Street for 21 years. She spent the last decade of her career advocating against Wall Street’s private justice system, which keeps its crimes shielded from public courtrooms. She has been writing on public interest issues for CounterPunch since retiring in 2006. She has no security position, long or short, in any company mentioned in this article.
—————————————————————————————————-
