Month: July 2022

Authored by Patricia Tolson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A 104-page report issued three months after the events at the Capitol Building on Jan. 6, 2021, said the Capitol Police’s Civil Disturbance Unit (CDU) was ordered by supervisors not to use “heavier, less-lethal weapons,” like flash bangs. However, video evidence—along with Capitol Police Use of Force Reports obtained exclusively by The Epoch Times—exposes conflicts in timelines, the brutality of the unprovoked attacks against Jan. 6 protesters, and how leadership ordered the deployment of munitions on a peaceful crowd.

The Video Evidence

Victoria White

According to Police1, the “#1 resource for law enforcement online,” which promotes “the highest standards of business ethics,” police are trained to target large muscle groups like legs, chest, abdomen, and arms with batons. Intentionally striking areas like the head, sternum, and spine are considered to be the same act of deadly force as firing a gun.

However, a video shows Jan. 6 defendant Victoria White being beaten over the head 35 times with a metal baton and punched in the face by an officer of the Metropolitan Police of the District of Columbia. White, seen wearing a Trump hat, is unarmed and posed no threat to the officer. She raises her hands in defense during the brutal attack, collapsing more than once, only to be stood up by other officers to be maced and beaten again.

According to a Use of Force report filed 1/7/21 by Officer Dante Price, obtained exclusively by The Epoch Times, “approved strike areas” for use of a baton “include arms, legs and large muscle groups.” Injuries suffered by Dante’s victim required hospital transport. Another report of an injury caused by use of a baton, filed 1/8/21 by Officer Ryan Kendall, states “approved target areas” include the “upper abdomen.”

“To add insult to injury,” her legal team said at a Jan. 6, 2022 press conference, “she was indicted for being pushed into the tunnel entrance and for daring to put her hands up in a defensive posture while getting beaten by the police.”

White has filed a $1 million lawsuit against D.C. Police Chief Robert Contree and seven unnamed officers, including one known as “Officer Whiteshirt,” given the moniker as it is believed his clothing identified him as an officer in a position of authority.

Roseanne Boyland

Another video obtained by The Epoch Times shows D.C. Metro Police Officer Lila Morris beating an unconscious 34-year-old Roseanne Boyland of Kennesaw, Georgia with a steel baton and then with a large wooden walking stick. According to witnesses, Boyland lost consciousness and stopped breathing after being crushed beneath the weight of other fallen protesters. Being unconscious, Boyland was no threat to the officer.

A DC medical examiner claims Boyland died of an accidental overdose of Adderall, a suspicious ruling that sparked outrage from Boyland’s friends and family. Her father, Bret Boyland, said his daughter had been taking Adderall for about 10 years to treat an attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

The Epoch Times reported on Feb. 10, an investigation by the department’s Internal Affairs Bureau cleared Morris of any wrongdoing and deemed her beating of the unconscious Boyland as “objectively reasonable.”

A separate report describes how Morris first used the wooden stick while beating Boyland to strike 41-year-old filmmaker Luke Coffee on the left elbow. A second swing missed before she sprayed him in the face with pepper gel. “Morris then inexplicably turned her fury on the motionless Boyland, striking her in the ribs once and twice in the head,” the report said.

Ashli Babbitt

Ashli Babbitt, a 35-year-old unarmed Air Force veteran and ardent supporter of former President Donald Trump was shot and killed by U.S. Capitol Police Lt. Michael Byrd. While news media has labeled Babbitt as a violent “insurrectionist” who was trying to breach the Speaker’s Lobby, a frame-by-frame analysis of the video from The Epoch Times shows Babbitt tried to stop the violence against the Speaker’s Lobby at least four times before she was fatally shot.

Two reports, filed by two officers who were with Byrd at the moment he shot Babbitt, were also obtained exclusively by The Epoch Times.

According to a report by Paul McKenna of the United States Capitol Police (USCP) Uniformed Service Bureau, as protesters “began pounding” on the “East door of the lobby” and breaking the glass, he drew his weapon along with Byrd and Officer Reggie Tyson. He “yelled ‘stay back’ ‘get back’ several times during the incident.”

“A woman climbed through the far left window pane, which had been broken out by the group,” McKenna attested. “Lt. Byrd fired one shot hitting the woman. She fell back out of the window and I continued yelling at the group to get back and away from the doors.”

McKenna claims the incident happened between 1430 and 1500 hours (2:30 p.m. and 3:00 p.m.). The report was signed by McKenna on June 9, 2021. It was signed by his supervisor five months earlier, on Jan. 7, 2021.

In the second report, filed Jan. 7, 2021, Tyson said he heard “shots fired” over his radio some time after 1440 (2:40 p.m.). In an attempt to protect himself, Tyson said he withdrew his weapon and made his way to the lobby east side of the capitol along with Byrd and McKenna. “A protester tried to climb through the broken window where she was shot one time as she fell back.” Tyson claims the time of the incident was around 1500 hours (3:00 p.m.).

In another report, USCP Officer Tyler Stoyle claims he responded to “a shots fired” call over their his radio at “1400 hours” (2:00 p.m.), 40 minutes earlier than Tyson claimed to have heard the call of “shots fired.”

A separate report filed by USCP Officer Jason McGinnis, said he “responded to the North side of Crypt” at “approximately 1400 hours” and drew his baton to “hold the line of unscreened individuals that were trespassing.”

However, it wasn’t until “after the initial surge had ended” and McGinnis “was moving trespassers out of the South Door” that he claimed “there were reports of shots fired in the Speaker’s Lobby Stairs to the second floor.”

During an interview with NBC, Byrd also claimed to hear “shots fired.”

However, Byrd was the only one to fire a weapon on Jan. 6, 2021. This, and the conflicts in times reported by police regarding when they heard “shots fired,” raises questions.

According to a July 25 report by The Epoch Times, Stan Kephart—a 42-year law enforcement veteran and former director of security for the 1984 Los Angeles Summer Olympics who has testified in court more than 350 times as an expert witness on policing issues—said Babbitt was “murdered … under the color of authority.”

However, a review of the reports filed by Tyson and McKenna, the Bureau Commander found “the circumstances support the Use of Force” and did not recommend any further investigation.

Byrd also told NBC he yelled verbal warnings so hard that his throat hurt for days after. Neither of the reports filed by Tyson or McKenna corroborate his claim. Byrd cannot be heard shouting anything on the video either.

Byrd insisted he opened fire on an unarmed Babbitt only as a “last resort.”

“I know that day I saved countless lives,” Byrd said.

In August 2021, the U.S. Capitol Police investigation cleared Byrd of any wrongdoing.

Use of Force Reports

According to a report released March 7 by the United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), “the January 6th attack on the Capitol raised concerns” about the preparedness of USCP “to respond to violent demonstrations.”

Key findings from the report:

• Eighty officers “identified concerns related to use of force, including that they felt discouraged or hesitant to use force because of a fear of disciplinary actions.”
• Approximately 150 Capitol Police officers reported 293 use of force incidents on Jan. 6. All were deemed justified by the department.
• These incidents involved pushing (91), batons (83), withdrawing a firearm from its holster (37), chemical spray (34), other physical tactics (22), pointing a firearm at a person (17), less-lethal munitions (7), a diversionary device (1) and firing a firearm (1).

Of the 293 Use of Force (UOF) reports filed, The Epoch Times has obtained 161 of them, including the ones filed by Tyson and McKenna regarding the shooting of Babbitt by Byrd.

‘Less Than Lethal Munitions’ UOF Reports

According to one UOF report, dated 1/7/21, Officer Adam Descamp said he was ordered by Deputy Chief Eric Waldow “to deploy less than lethal munitions on an overwhelming number of rioters at the U.S. Capitol.

“I deployed multiple FN303 projectiles from the FN303 launcher, administered strikes with the PR-24 baton and utilized the Sabre red pepper spray to gain compliance from the rioters that were aggressively attacking officers on the police line and throughout the Capitol complex,” Descamp wrote of his actions at “approximately 1215 hours” (12:15 p.m.).

Waldow was incident commander of the Civil Disturbance Unit on Jan. 6, which was reported to be highly disorganized and woefully unprepared.

At “approximately 1215 hours,” Officer Melissa Lee also reported on 1/7/21 that she “was ordered to the scene by Deputy Chief Waldow to deploy less than lethal munitions on an overwhelming number of rioters at the U.S. Capitol Building,” using nearly the same, identical verbiage as Descamp.

“I deployed multiple FN303 projectiles from the FN303 launcher to gain compliance from the rioters that were aggressively attacking officers on the police line and throughout the Capitol complex,” she wrote.

A report filed by Officer Matthew Flood, also “at approximately 1215 hours,” also states he was ordered by Deputy Chief Waldow “to deploy less than lethal munitions on an overwhelming number of rioters at the U.S. Capitol.”

“I deployed multiple projectiles from the FN303 launcher, and chemical agent spray,” he wrote, using language remarkably similar to that of Descamp and Lee, “to gain compliance from the rioters that were aggressively attacking officers on the police line and throughout the Capitol complex,” he wrote on his report, also date 1/7/21.

“At approximately 1215 hours,” Officer Tina Cobert also reported on 1/7/21 that she “was ordered to deploy less than lethal munitions on an overwhelming number of rioters at the U.S. Capitol by Deputy Chief Waldow.

“I deployed multiple projectiles from the FN 303 Launcher to gain compliance from the rioters that were aggressively attacking officers on the police line and throughout the Capitol complex,” she also wrote.

Also “at approximately 1215 hours,” Officer Christopher Sprifke reported he “was ordered to deploy less than lethal munitions on an overwhelming number of rioters at the U.S. Capitol by Deputy Chief Waldow.

“I deployed multiple PepperBall projectiles to gain compliance from the rioters that were aggressively attacking officers on the police line and throughout the Capitol building,” he wrote in his 1/7/21 report.

“At approximately 1215 hours,” Officer Shauni Kerkhoff said she was also “ordered by Deputy Chief Waldow, Eric to deploy less than lethal munitions on an overwhelming number of rioters at the U.S. Capitol.

“I deployed multiple projectiles from the PepperBall launcher to gain compliance from the rioters that were aggressively attacking officers on the police line and throughout the Capitol complex,” she wrote in his report, also dated 1/7/21.

In February 2021, the U.S. Capitol police union issued an overwhelming no-confidence vote for a half-dozen of the force’s top leaders, including Waldow.

Instead of leading his team of officers, Waldow chose to physically engage rioters, a move many of his fellow officers saw as wrong. In October 2021, Waldow submitted paperwork for his resignation.

At “approximately 1400hrs,” Officer Patrick Kahl reported that he “discharged multiple 40mm baton rounds after individuals began and continued fighting with USP Officers while trying to gain unlawful access to the United States Capitol Building through the Rotunda Door.”

At 1500 hours, Officer Justin Green reported launching a flash bang “to disperse the crowd” in an effort to “rescue” one of the department’s sergeants who was “pinned in the center of the crowd.” He fired a second flash bang as demonstrators were “breaching the Rotunda door.”

Conflicting Reports

These UOF reports contradict the report issued by then-Capitol Police Inspector General Michael Bolton, who said the CDU was ordered by supervisors not to use less than lethal munitions and that “heavier, less-lethal weapons,” including flash bangs, “were not used that day because of orders from leadership.”

Read more here…

A brand new, half-billion-dollar bridge in Los Angeles that opened July 9 has already been plagued by frequent police closures, as people treat it like some kind of Grand Theft Auto amusement park.

As Associated Press reports: 

The 6th Street Viaduct — which soars over the concrete-lined Los Angeles River to connect downtown to the historic Eastside — quickly became a hotspot for street racing, graffiti and illegal takeovers that draw hundreds of spectators to watch drivers perform dangerous stunts in their vehicles.

Taking over six years to build at a cost of $588 million, it was the largest bridge project in the city’s history. However, many drivers trying to use the bridge at night are finding they’re out of luck thanks to Angelenos going wild on the festively-lit structure with outstanding downtown views. 

Multiple crashes have already happened, including an accident on July 18 in which the driver of Dodge Challenger lost control as he was doing a burnout and smashed into two other vehicles. He grabbed his things and fled the scene, but later turned himself in and was charged with misdemeanor hit-and-run. 

Street takeover on newly opened half billion dollar 6th street bridge ends in crash involving several vehicles.

This lawlessness is literally destroying our community. pic.twitter.com/6Ydg902Kza

— Kevin Dalton (@KevinForBOS) July 19, 2022

Then there’s this wannabe Hollywood stunt man…

No wonder why police closed down 6th street bridge at nights lol . Night time L.A. People are a menace 😂 pic.twitter.com/2ggWVlFHej

— el Vale 🇬🇹 (@elvale_1) July 24, 2022

Meanwhile, many pedestrians can’t resist the urge to climb the bridge’s many arches. Skateboarders are also trying their luck on them. Nobody’s fallen to their deaths…yet. 

While shooting a story on the problems with the new #6thstreetBridge we saw this problem on the new 6th Street Bridge. pic.twitter.com/Pw7kskoyDV

— Alex Rozier (@AlexNBCLA) July 26, 2022

Man caught doing parkour stunt on 6th street bridge in Boyle Heights. pic.twitter.com/JChIXs5PzM

— Boyle Heights (@boyle_hts) July 23, 2022

Spontaneous concerts are breaking out too, but perhaps the craziest stunt was this haircut given smack in the middle of the median-less bridge as heavy traffic passed in both directions: 

Man gets haircut in the middle of the 6th Street Bridge in Boyle Heights pic.twitter.com/20d8jzZAeC

— Boyle Heights (@boyle_hts) July 21, 2022

The wild action has prompted police to shut down the 3,500-foot-long bridge several times already — including four shutdowns in just the past five days.

Now, in a desperate effort to throw a wet blanket on the Angeleno hijinks, the city’s preparing to throw more money at the structure. ​​​Speed bumps are being installed and fencing will be added to help prevent people from climbing up the arches. 

John Yi, who leads Los Angeles Walks, a pedestrian advocacy group, tells The Associated Press the design was a recipe for trouble: “If you provide a concrete jungle gym, then that’s how people will use it.”

Naturally, the Los Angeles Times is calling for the city to simply surrender to the mobs. In an editorial posted Wednesday, it called for the city to start closing the bridge “several nights or days each week” — but then to close it to vehicles forever.

With a straight face, the paper of record in a city notorious for its traffic wos urged the government to turn the half-billion-dollar bridge into “a place for community concerts, a farmers market or whatever residents want.”

Seems like there’s already too many people in Los Angeles doing whatever they want. 

At least this guy’s got the right idea…

Man does the first proposal on the #6thstreetbridge in Boyle Heights.
📸: @flowers.562 pic.twitter.com/ozQNLHSc1Y

— Boyle Heights (@boyle_hts) July 26, 2022

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A U.S. senator is asking the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to clear up conflicting statements on whether a specific method of COVID-19 vaccine safety research is being conducted.

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) asked CDC Director Rochelle Walensky for details after The Epoch Times reported that Dr. John Su, a CDC doctor, claimed that the CDC has been performing Proportional Reporting Ratio analyses on data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System since February 2021.

That conflicted with the CDC telling the nonprofit Children’s Health Defense that it not only did not conduct the analyses but that the method “is outside of th[e] agency’s purview.”

“CDC’s assertion and Dr. Su’s statement cannot both be true,” Johnson told Walensky in a new letter, released on July 26 and dated July 25.

“The American people deserve the truth and you have not been providing it. That is why I, together with millions of Americans, have completely lost faith in the CDC and other federal health agencies. It is time to start regaining their confidence and your agency’s integrity by coming clean, being transparent, and telling the truth,” Johnson wrote.

He asked for Walensky to immediately respond to a letter he sent before requesting information on the CDC’s vaccine safety research. He also requested she confirm whether Dr. Su’s statement is true and if it is, why the CDC claimed it had not conducted the analyses.

And if Dr. Su’s statement is accurate, Johnson wants all of the Proportional Reporting Ratio analyses that the CDC has performed since February 2021.

Finally, Johnson asked for Dr. Su to be made available for an interview with his office concerning the data examinations.

The CDC and Walensky did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Background

The CDC said in an operating procedures document dated Jan. 29, 2021, that it “will perform” Proportional Reporting Ratio (PRR), a type of data mining analysis that compares the counts of adverse event reports following vaccination with one vaccine to those that have been reported after receipt of another vaccine or vaccines.

Read more here…

Instead of addressing California’s crippling drought with network of desalination plants (a plan which actually had the support of Gov. Gavin Newsom until the state’s HOA – aka the Coastal Commission – shot it down earlier this year), the city of Los Angeles and other agencies across Southern California are considering a plan to recycle wastewater into tap water.

Just don’t call it “toilet to tap” say proponents (or do, because that’s what it is), who claim it’s different from similar proposals in the late 1990s to use recycled water thanks to new technologies in water recycling.

The city of Los Angeles and agencies across Southern California are looking into what’s known as “direct potable reuse,” which means putting purified recycled water directly back into our drinking water systems. This differs from indirect potable reuse, where water spends time in a substantial environmental barrier such as an underground aquifer or in a reservoir. –LA Times

“There’s been a public health legacy where sanitary engineering practices and regulators considered sewage a waste, it was something to be avoided, something to be feared,” said Brad Coffey of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. “Now that we have the technology … the public, the regulators, the scientific community has much greater confidence in our ability to safely reuse that water supply.”

The plan hinges on the State Water Resources Control Bord, which legislators have tasked with developing a set of uniform regulations by Dec. 31 which would govern potable reuse.

Los Angeles, according to the report, “is wasting no time in readying projects that can launch once the regulations are passed.”

A direct potable reuse demonstration facility near the Headworks reservoir just north of Griffith Park probably will be the state’s first approved direct potable reuse project, said Jesus Gonzalez, manager of water recycling policy at the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. It will take advantage of recycled water produced by a facility in Glendale, but the water will not be added to the drinking water system just yet. However, it will serve as proof of concept, he said. -LA Times

“This is going to be the future of L.A.’s water, the future of the state’s water supply,” said Gonzalez, who added that the Headworks project could come online within the next five years.

LA’s plans are much bigger than that, however – as the city has set out to recycle 100% of its wastewater by 2035 per a pledge made by Mayor Eric Garcetti several years ago.

In order to achieve this, LA’s Hyperion Water Reclamation Plant – which currently only treats wastewater so it’s clean enough to release into Santa Monica Bay – must be completely converted into an advanced water purification facility which produces water that’s clean enough to consume.

The water – enough for 2 million people – would then be piped to vast aquifers under the southern part of LA County and the San Fernando Valley. Dubbed ‘Operation Next,’ the massive undertaking will cost upward of $16 billion and would be completed in 2058 – more than two decades after Garcetti’s goal.

The Hyperion plant suffered a catastrophic flood just one year ago, which led to 17 million gallons of untreated sewage to be dumped into the ocean, causing millions of gallons of drinking water to be diverted for uses typically served by treated wastewater. The plan is now back to normal operation.

“That spill did reinforce everybody, including us, that we do need to have monitors and alarms upstream of the wastewater plant to be able to identify any problems, whether they’re spills, whether they’re infrastructure issues,” said Gonzalez.

Baby steps…

For now, a proof-of-concept for the Hyperion operation, a small-scale advanced purification facility is nearly complete. Constructed in partnership with LA International Airport, the plant will be able to crank out 1.5 million gallons per day of water for nonpotable uses, such as toilet flushing and cooling, according to LA Sanitation and Environment CEO Traci Minamide. It will come online in spring 2023.

“The technology is that good,” said Shane Trussell, president and chief executive of Trussell Tech, which is involved in advanced water purification projects across Los Angeles, San Diego and other cities. “I expect by 2040 … most of the effluent in Southern California will be recycled or well on its way to being recycled.”

Authored by Joseph M. Hanneman via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Maybe it was the death threat delivered by a fellow law-enforcement officer while he stood shackled in belly chains.

Perhaps it was being described as a “terrorist” by a federal judge who will preside over his trial.

It could have been being released on bail by a U.S. magistrate judge in Tennessee, only to be ordered held until trial by a U.S. district judge in Washington D.C.

Former sheriff’s deputy Ronald Colton McAbee, 28, of Tennessee, has faced a difficult road since being indicted for alleged criminal actions at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Arguably the most trying situation for McAbee was being denied bail for nearly a year based on video evidence that his attorney now says exonerates him.

“What makes the government’s case weak is the fact that the videos actually exonerate Mr. McAbee of the very allegations made against him, and Mr. McAbee is motivated to appear for trial, take the stand and narrate those videos for [the] jury,” wrote attorney William Shipley in a May 2022 motion to have his client released from jail.

McAbee, a former sheriff’s deputy in Tennessee and Georgia with more than seven years of law-enforcement experience as a deputy and correctional officer, was charged by federal prosecutors with seven alleged crimes.

Charges included assaulting, resisting, or impeding a federal officer, two counts of civil disorder, entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds with a deadly or dangerous weapon, disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds with a deadly or dangerous weapon, engaging in physical violence in a restricted building or grounds with a deadly or dangerous weapon, and committing an act of physical violence in the Capitol grounds or buildings.

McAbee was outside the Lower West Terrace tunnel during some of the worst violence on January 6. Several times he tried to render lifesaving aid to a dying Rosanne Boyland, 34, of Kennesaw, Georgia. His interactions with Metropolitan Police Department officers resulted in most of the charges and served as justification for a D.C. judge to jail him until trial.

McAbee was arrested on Aug. 17, 2021, in Tennessee. At a detention hearing on Aug. 26, prosecutors argued that McAbee assaulted Metropolitan Police Department Officer Andrew Wyatt. They said after Wyatt fell at the tunnel entrance, McAbee—who had a broken shoulder from a car accident nine days earlier—pulled him down the concrete stairs into a hostile crowd.

The prosecutor played a video for the court, but there was no sound, according to Sarah McAbee, Ronald McAbee’s wife. The lack of audio would later prove to be a crucial element of the story.

After the detention hearing was continued on Sept. 8, 2021, Magistrate Judge Jeffery Frensley ruled against the U.S. Department of Justice and ordered McAbee released pending trial.

No Danger to Community

“I do not believe that Mr. McAbee poses a future danger to the community if he were to be released between now and the time that he resolves this case,” Judge Frensley said. “And the government, despite my request that they provide me any evidence that he’s presented any sort of a danger to the community, have been able to point to absolutely nothing beyond the events around and during January the 6th.”

Judge Frensley said what he saw on the video was open to interpretation. McAbee’s guilt or innocence could not be part of the consideration for bond, he said.

“We have a system that presumes innocence, and for me to make a decision where I become judge, jury, and executioner all in the same role without affording him the rights he’s entitled to under the constitution is inappropriate,” Frensley said. “And that’s the important distinction between the bond decision and the decision on guilt that will follow at a trial.”

That victory for McAbee was short-lived. Prosecutors filed an emergency appeal the same day in U.S. District Court in Washington D.C. Senior District Judge Emmet Sullivan stayed Frensley’s order and scheduled hearings on the government’s motion to keep McAbee behind bars until trial.

During a hearing on Sept. 22, 2021, Sullivan seemed to telegraph his eventual decision to hold McAbee without bond.

When being shown a video with McAbee wearing body armor with a patch that read “Sheriff,” Judge Sullivan said, “That’s pretty outrageous,” according to the official hearing transcript. A short time later, Sullivan said, “These videos are very disturbing.” He made several statements agreeing with the prosecutor’s assessment of the evidence.

Sullivan then suggested McAbee is a terrorist.

“So it appears clearly to this court that the defendant is pulling the officer back into the crowd of other terrorists,” Sullivan said, according to the transcript.

After another hearing on Oct. 13, 2021, Sullivan reversed Frensely’s order and ruled that McAbee should not be released pending trial. Sullivan said he would issue a written ruling, which was released more than two months later on Dec. 21, 2021.

While Frensley told prosecutors they did not show evidence that McAbee had done anything to prove he was a danger during the eight months between January 6 and his August arrest, Sullivan ruled that the only way to protect the community is to keep McAbee in jail.

“The court concludes that clear and convincing evidence supports a finding that no condition or combination of conditions will reasonably assure the safety of the community,” Judge Sullivan wrote (pdf) in his 41-page ruling.

Sarah McAbee was stunned.

“It’s just the craziest situation, them saying he’s a danger to the community when he’s been a law enforcement officer and never has had stripes on his record, let alone a speeding ticket,” Sarah McAbee told The Epoch Times.

A break in McAbee’s case came when video investigator Gary McBride of Decatur, Texas, studied the bodycam footage shown in court, except with the audio track turned on. It painted a vastly different picture of what took place, McBride told The Epoch Times.

“The prosecutors did not play the audio of AW [Andrew Wyatt] and McAbee talking during this point,” McBride said in a video he made about the evidence. “McAbee is trying to save AW. Prosecutors didn’t play that in court.”

McBride said his analysis showed McAbee did not pull the officer down the stairs, but was swept backward and lost his balance, due to two protesters pulling on the officer’s legs. McAbee was standing over Wyatt at the time. As a result, McAbee fell on top of Wyatt and was over him for about 25 seconds.

While McAbee was on top of Wyatt, bystanders called him a traitor, ostensibly for helping the officer. When someone in the crowd tried to grab at Wyatt, McAbee shouted, “No!” and “Quit!”

“At that point, my husband just saw an officer down and an officer needing help, because the first thing he says, when he pops in around the tunnel before he gets around the rail is, ‘Hey, you guys have a man down,’” Sarah McAbee said. “They literally did nothing to help that guy. So he’s the one who jumped into action.”

Sarah said she was relieved when she learned the audio track from the evidence videos backs up what her husband told her that day.

Story is Consistent

“My husband’s story has not changed from January 6. There’s actually a picture of him that they have on the FBI website of him on the phone,” she said. “I know that’s a phone call with me about everything that just went down.

“His story has not changed from that day to today. He’s just not a liar. That’s just not who he is and even the little details have always remained the same.”

McBride and Sarah McAbee said the audio track should have been disclosed to the defense as exculpatory evidence.

Read more here…

Life in most places is making an attempt to move forward from the pandemic lockdowns. But for one city block in New York, that isn’t the case.

Outside of the 59th Street subway stop, across Lexington Avenue, Bloomberg writes you can still find an entire block “frozen” in peak-pandemic time. 

The area, which used to be prime New York real estate, was formerly the home of Banana Republic, the Gap and Victoria’s Secret. Now, all people see are signs trying to find tenants for the empty buildings. 

Steve Soutendijk, an executive managing director at Cushman & Wakefield, told Bloomberg: “It’s probably the slowest market to return to pre-Covid levels out of any in New York City. It’s a little bit of a mystery.”

This block is a microcosm of how slow the city has been to recover, post-lockdowns, the report says. It was also suffering heading into Covid, with ridership exiting at 59th Street “declining for years” and businesses starting to select other parts of the city in favor of occupying the block. 

Now, ridership at the “Bloomingdale’s Area”, as brokers call it, and the 59th Street stop is down 50% since 2014. The department store used to be the big draw in the neighborhood, which would then act as a feeder for smaller retail shops in the area.

But as online shopping has gained in prominence and since the pandemic severed off a large portion of the local businesses, the department store is “no longer the anchor it once was”, the report says. 

Michael Hirschfeld, a vice chairman at real estate firm Jones Lang LaSalle, said: “It’s a model of shopping that’s not entirely in favor at the moment.”

Help from tourists has also waned, with international visitors only expected to reach 60% of pre-Covid levels this year, the report says. 

But walking traffic is on the rise, the report says. More people are walking down that block than they did when the retail space was occupies in 2019, the report says, citing cell phone tracking data. Foot traffic in the area is outpacing other surrounding areas.

Maybe that’s why Soutendijk can’t help but shed a little optimism. He concluded: “I don’t think these spaces are staying vacant forever.”

By Charles Kennedy of OilPrice.com

In a first for Chinese offshore shale, state-run oil giant CNOOC has announced what it claims to be a commercial discovery in the Beibu Gulf in the South China Sea with the tapping of oil and gas flows at a wildcat well. 

The discovery, at the Weiye 1 wildcat well, the first shale well China has ever drilled offshore, could be a game-changer for the country’s dependence on oil and gas imports, according to Chinese media. 

CNOOC estimates that the Beibu gulf holds some 8.76 billion barrels of shale oil in place, and Thursday’s announcement claimed that the wildcat well flowed 20 cubic meters/day of shale oil and 1,589 cubic meters/day of natural gas, which the Chinese oil giant is referring to as a commercial discovery. 

Speaking to the Global Times about the discovery, Lin Boqiang, director of the China Center for Energy Economics Research at Xiamen University, questioned the next steps, including what he referred to as the “technical difficulty of shale oil extraction” and the high costs of production. 

While China is thought to have more than 30 trillion cubic meters of recoverable shale gas, it has struggled with development–all of which has been onshore to date. 

According to Wood Mackenzie, unconventional oil production accounts for less than 1% of China’s total crude oil output due to “high breakevens and non-commercial economics”, but the country’s NOCs are spending top dollar to develop new technologies to ensure feasibility. 

That technological development so far is being heralded by CNOOC as the impetus behind the country’s first-ever offshore shale discovery. 

In a note originally published by Thepaper.cn and translated by the Global Times, the head of CNOOC’s exploration department said the success of the first offshore shale oil drilling marked the realization of the independent exploration and development of China’s offshore shale oil and gas resources with self-developed technology.

The real question that needs to be asked is “who was winning?”  An AI driven chess playing robot went berserk last Thursday and crushed a 7-year-old boy’s finger during a match at the Moscow Chess Open in Russia.  The robot apparently grabbed hold of the boy’s finger in the middle of moving one of his own pieces and continued to squeeze until the finger broke.  It took four adults to pry the machine away from the child.

Officials at the Moscow Open claim the boy “violated safety rules” when playing the machine, but they offered no further explanation as to why the robot interrupted the child moving his own piece, or why it was built with the strength to crush human fingers.  Does it really need that kind of compression force to pick up chess pieces? 

The robot was brought in for an exhibition and the Moscow Chess Open says they have nothing to do with its programming or operation.  

The conundrum here should be obvious – Either the robot was programmed to disrupt human players and grab their pieces or their fingers for crushing, or, it was NOT programmed to do that but did it anyway.  Both options are equally disconcerting.

While this story by itself is not all that frightening, it does raise further questions about the growing prevalence of Artificial Intelligence algorithms and our reliance on robotics in everyday life.  AI is even being tested as a tool for predicting “pre-crime.”  One core concern of course is that machines have no conscience and never will.  Actions might be decided in terms of “logic,” but the most logical decision might also be the most immoral decision.  Furthermore, when an AI machine does something that harms a person, who is held accountable?  Do we blame the programmers, or a machine which is supposedly autonomous?

Did the chess playing machine in Moscow simply malfunction?  Probably.  The officials at the event blame the child (of course they do), but the young boy who was injured is among some of the top players in Russia. What if the machine was losing and came to the “logical” conclusion that winning required other measures outside of the game?

Some scary food for thought. 

Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Former President Donald Trump has warned that America’s economy is on track for a bigger disaster than a recession, with his remarks coming shortly before government statistics showed GDP printing negative for the second consecutive quarter, which is a rule-of-thumb definition for a recession.

“Where we’re going now could be a very bad place,” Trump said at a rally in Arizona last week.

“We got to get this act in order, we have to get this country going, or we’re going to have a serious problem.”

The former president singled out the collapse in Americans’ real wages, a historically depressed labor force participation rate, and the Democrat push for the Green New Deal that he said would crush economic growth.

“Not recession. Recession’s a nice word. We’re going to have a much bigger problem than recession. We’ll have a depression,” the former president said.

Trump’s remarks came several days before the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) released data showing that real U.S. GDP fell by an annualized 0.9 percent in the second quarter after contracting 1.6 percent in the first quarter.

Two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth are a common rule-of-thumb definition for a recession, although recessions in the United States are officially declared by a committee of economists at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) using a broader definition than the two-quarter rule.

Vance Ginn, Chief Economist at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, told The Epoch Times’ sister media NTD in an interview that, while officially it’s NBER that calls recessions, the two-quarter rule is “usually how it’s done by a rule of thumb.”

“I think this is definitely recession that we’re in now from these bad policies,” Ginn added, blaming a series of “progressive policies” coming out of the White House and the Democrat-controlled House.

Stagflationary Winds Blowing

In his remarks, Trump also took aim at President Joe Biden’s handling of the economy, blaming him for soaring inflation.

“Biden created the worst inflation in 47 years. We’re at 9.1 percent, but the actual number is much, much higher than that,” Trump said.

While the former president didn’t provide his own estimate for the true rate of inflation, an alternative CPI inflation gauge developed by economist John Williams, calculated according to the same methodology used by the U.S. government in the 1980s, puts the figure at 17.3 percent, a 75-year high.

Trump also said that persistently high inflation combined with an economic slowdown has put the country “on the verge of a devastating” spell of stagflation, which is a combination of accelerating prices and slowing economic growth.

Inflation is “going higher and higher all the time,” Trump said, adding that it’s “costing families nearly $6,000 a year, bigger than any tax increase ever proposed other than the tax increase that they want to propose right now.”

In Trump’s first full month in office in February 2017, the headline Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation gauge came in at 2.8 percent in annual terms. While the CPI measure fluctuated during his tenure, the highest it ever reached was 2.9 percent in July 2018, while in his final month in office, January 2021, inflation clocked in at 1.4 percent.

Under Biden, inflation has climbed steadily, soaring 9.1 percent year-over-year in June 2022, a figure not seen in more than 40 years.

Read more here…

As the water level of the nation’s largest artificial reservoir recedes due to a devastating drought, human bodies keep emerging. 

Human remains have been discovered in Lake Mead for the third time in three months. The U.S. National Park Service reported the grim discovery. They said, “human remains were discovered at Swim Beach in Lake Mead National Recreation Area at approximately 4:30 p.m. PST on Monday.” 

We are out at Lake Mead where more human remains were found just yesterday. This is the third discovery of remains since beginning of May. The barrel with a body in it was just about a half of a mile from yesterday’s location. @KTNV pic.twitter.com/CtYVLK4HZi

— Joe Moeller (@joemoeller44) July 26, 2022

The Clark County Office of the Coroner/Medical Examiner retrieved the body that night. The cause of death remains a mystery. 

“The investigation is ongoing. No further information is available at this time,” National Park Service said. 

Coroner and medical personnel loading up the human remains found at Lake Mead today. The third set of human remains discovered since May 1. First was the body in a barrel, then remains half buried, and now these. All of them appear to have been discovered due to receding waters pic.twitter.com/RLFWcJLToH

— Brett Forrest (@brettforrest89) July 26, 2022

The first body, discovered on May 1, was stuffed in a barrel, likely a murder victim who died “sometime in the mid-’70s to early ’80s, based on clothing and footwear the victim was found with,” according to a press release from the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police. Paddleboards discovered the second body on May 7. 

Besides bodies, receding waters revealed sunken boats and trash scattered across the lake’s dried-out parts. 

 

As of Wednesday, Lake Mead’s water level was at 1,040 feet, approximately 174 feet below its level in 2000 when the great drought began. 

“Continuing a 22-year downward trend, water levels in Lake Mead stand at their lowest since April 1937, when the reservoir was still being filled for the first time,” NASA wrote in a report last week. The U.S. space agency also released satellite images of the lake’s water level falling over time. 

“We will likely find additional bodies that have been dumped in Lake Mead” as the water level continues to drop, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Homicide Lt. Ray Spencer said in May.