World of crafty terror?

So the fed is starting to worry about terrorists discussing their evil schemes ... over world of warcraft?
Well, terrorists or other criminals could hypothetically use these games chat channels, coupled with some code-language to discuss the detail of their crimes. I mean, it would be perfectly possible to set up a drug deal over WoW (drugs are the anti-WoW after all), I suppose one could be talking worse as well.

I just feel like people are digging deep here, and I hope they've got better avenues than this one to pursue ...

• some day soon, we might find secret agents in World of Warcraft, along with the druids and orcs and night elves.

Hm, 60's era LSD ring infiltration all over again eh?

Current events in the UK

It's been two weeks since I last wrote this "column" ... it's not gotten any better.

Even CNN released a video of the latest child victim of knife crime, a 16 year old boy stabbed to death. A young man was stabbed and remains in critical condition, security guards were attacked, stabbed and cut as they tried to chase down suspected shoplifters. Another man, 19 years of age, was attacked and presumably stabbed, he too is in critical condition.
There's been multiple robberies by criminals armed with knives, two are reported here, at least one person was injured. One would think that serious punishments such as this one (over 11 years in jail) would serve as a deterrent. If not, perchance we could re-introduce the chance of being shot during the comission of a crime?

Moving out of the realm of knives and other sharp objects: there's been an arson attack against a bussiness, fortunately, nobody was injured. Another arson attack targeted an inhabited house, two senior citizens were indoors when the attack took place, neither is reported to have been injured. A pipe-bomb exploded, causing serious material damage to a house, fortunately nobody was hurt.

Despite legislation that amounts to an effective ban on firearms, a man was shot earlier today, injured in the stomach, he'll most likely live.
A seventeen year old girl was repeadedly raped by three men.

Police are continuing to wage war on drugs, arresting multiple dealers in targeted raids. I do hope they manage to keep up their successes, they generally don't leave any inoccents dead and do manage to haul back a lot of contraband, unfortunately that's not enough ... it's never enough ...

Mexican military drug dealers ...

Now there's a phrase to blasted off my WTF missile ... Mexican military drug dealers ... got a sound to it, double alliteration right there ... no seriously, what?!

Just because they hump around in tac-black body armor (along with a thousands of internet commando's and tacticool airsofters alike), that doesn't make them "military" ... a squad of properly trained soldiers doesn't fire off a hundred round, killing only one, and then make a run for it.

So now police are complaining that they are "outgunned" by these villains. Thank god nobody told that to said criminals, I doubt they would have made such an effort to avoid capture, if they'd realized they could have just "hosed down" the cops with their superior firepower.

Aforementioned police officers now want better equipment, new uniforms and -I can only guess- a shrubbery

Home invasion: 100 shots fired.

A story like we've seen all to often before, but still impressive:

A drug house got knocked over by a gang of criminals dressed as police officers (helmets, body armor, the works) who ended up killing one man by fireing over 100 rounds of ammonution.

I'd be very interested in finding out what kind of guns were used here. This article mentions handguns, in this video, we can see a handgun holster recovered at the scene being bagged. I somehow doubt we're talking long guns that look like assault weapons, but a lot of articles mention "several weapons" without going into detail.

Still, even at 10 round per magazine, the six men would all just have to reload once to get these results.

Another child victim of gun violence.

Once again, another poor, teenage child has fallen victim to the horrible scourge of gun violence that plaeges the nation.
One Alfredo Cruz was gunned down by his drug dealer when he came up short in paying his tab ... wait, what?

Said dealer was a 16 year old, who can not legally purchase or even possess a gun out in the state of Florida.
So, illegal posession of a firearm, trafficking narcotics, posession with intent to sell ... manslaughter or murder?

The laws we have on the book right now are not preventing these matters, both the gun related crimes ans well as the drug-related ones. Coming down harder and harder as previous efforts fail miserably has not solved the drug problems ... might I suggest taking a different approach when it comes to guns?

Current events in the UK: start snitchin'!

And what a week it has been!
Welcome once again to the gun debate critic on sunday, casting a glance at the other side of the ocean. This weeks editions contains a high amount of recent devellopments, as well as a rather humorous story of how the police "surrounded" and stormed a house ... read on.

There's been a lot of activity on the "knife control" front, for god reason! A huge rally of knife control proponents was supposed to be adressed by gun-control activist Pat Regan, unfortunately she had been stabbed to death earlier this week. I suppose this -in a way- makes as strong a point as she could have made by being there in person.

After the "succesful" implementation of knife detectots on the streets, calls are being made to install knife arches at schools as well, to which the teachers replied (and I imagine): "but we don't want to disarms these kids, we'll get stabbed! If you see how those same kids have no reservations when it comes to beating a policeman can you blame them? One such kid has been charged with 11 assaults!

Another manner by which people are trying to curb violence, is by countering the underground "stop snitching" campaign by a "start snitching" project of their own, offering up to £1000 (that's two grand for y'all yanks) to kids who succesfully rat out a violent criminal.
I can only imagine the memories evoked in the lucky few who managed to escape the USSR or the DDR, societies halfly built around giving up information on percieved political undersirables.

Staying in line with StatSi doctrine: a compulsory national ID scheme is being called a threat to privacy by citizens rights groups, the usual rhetoric by both parties continues as the general population doesn't even look up from their game of footy and their desigated patch of pasture.

And on a -this isn't funny, but still I'm laughing- note: the police laid siege on a building said to contain men with weapons, according to an informant. However, when police finally stormed the place after a prolongued long standoff, they found it unoccupied. Claiming they have no reson to doubt their witness, the police assume the criminals must have fled out the back ... of a house which police claim they had surrounded ... (excuse me, I'm having diffculties controlling my laughter)

On to this weeks body count then:
There's been one fatal stabbing in a London nightclub. Someoen else was also stabbed to death. A young man has attacked a LEO with a knife, injuring him severely. A teenager was stabbed to death, a woman asphyxiated. And if you think it's all serious, there's been a drive-by bludgeoning with a brick! ... wait, that's serious too, the victim washurt pretty badly ...

70 people were arrested on (or in relation to) drug charges.

Current events in the UK

Welcome once again to the gun debate critic on sunday, when I like to continue the tale of a country that essentially banned guns, the united kingdom. It's a tale of violence and bloodshed, a tale that goes on, today ...

Despite the ban on actual guns, restrictions on guns that don't work, replica guns and toy guns, there has been an incident where a man threatened the residents of a house with a rifle, he has been charged with "possessing a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence". There's been actual firearm homicides, here's the second one.

The biggest problem however is knife crime, and not just knifes but sharp objects of all kinds are being used to gut, stab and kill children and adults alike.
"A spate" (=3) of people have been injured in a sword attack, Two children were stabbed to death, One taxi driver got stabbed by a robber, two women were killed after possibly being raped, new confirms one was stabbed to death, a stabbing victim was found on a beach ... the list goes on and one.

Didn't some group of people, often referred to as "gun nuts" predict this increase in knife crime as guns got banned?

Police are continuing their streak of succesfull drug raids, arresting dozens of people and confiscating drugs. This article suggests they should consider raiding a couple of prisons as well, as more and more drugs turn up on the inside of the prison system.

At least nobody got firebombed this week ...

Love is hate, peace is war and people bleeding out on the beaches after being stabbed by a mugger is security.

How to not fight drugs:

So, Japanese customs decided to test the effectiveness of their drug dogs by planting a sizeable amount of hashish in an unknowing passengers suitcase.
After which they lost track of the passenger ...
(clickable green link)

• NARITA — Customs officials have lost 124 grams of hashish they planted in an unknowing traveler’s luggage to train drug sniffing dogs, the head of Narita Customs said Monday.

  Customs officials are banned from using travelers’ luggage for training practices, but one worker said it was common practice.

  “We want to improve the sniffer dogs’ ability, so we have practiced this way several times in the past,” the official said on condition of anonymity.

  Manpei Tanaka, head of Customs’ Narita branch, apologized for the incident.

  “It’s extremely regrettable that we have invited this sort of situation on ourselves. We will investigate the facts behind the case, provide thorough training and deal strictly with those involved,” Tanaka said.

  Customs said the hash was stored in a metal container stuffed into the pocket of a soft, black suitcase belonging to one of 283 passengers traveling on Cathay Pacific Flight 520 from Hong Kong to Narita, which arrived at 3:31 p.m. on Sunday. The owner of the suitcase is unknown and passengers were not informed that their luggage would be used to train the drug-seeking dogs.

All I can do is read and laugh ... rinse and repeat ...

Current events in the UK

You weren't worried, were you?
Well, you should be, if you or your family lives in the UK, despite great efforts by the last administration cime is soaring high, people are dying and in denial, so here's a couple of facts:

I would appear that not a week goes by without somebody being found dead in the streets. Again someodies body, a 20 year old man, was found lifeless on the pavement. Cause of death undisclosed.
Another man was found dead after an attack, nature of his injuries undsclosed.
A child was slain in a high profile killing, beaten to death in a bakery shop.

There's been yet another firebombing. Didn't people like me and Oleg Volk warn of this exact thing? A gun is only marginally more effective at killing people than a bottle filled with gasoline, some random junk and a rag ... but guns have been banned while petrol and glass bottles remain available to the general public. What was that about a double standard two posts back?

Another thing "our side" warns off is that criminals under an administration that bans firearms will simply switch to knifes, as illustrated in this story. Not a big deal? Assailants with knives are roughly twice as likely to seriously injure you according to the USDOJ's study "weapon use and violent crime"

Half a million dollars worth of drugs, amphetamines and cocaine, was captured at the border, people aren't raising an eyebrow, especially not if they're dead.

Closing it off for today: the sword wielding gang who stabbed a kid in the heart, killing him has been convicted to spend "life" in prison. Not all of them, just three. A part of me hopes they too get stabbed, with something else than a sword in a place other than their heart.

Current events in the UK

It's sunday, you know the drill ...

Recently elected major Johnson has vowed to finally do something about the crime rate that was allowed to flourish under labour .
What crime would that be then?

Starting off with knife crime today; one man was found with multiple stab wounds he'll likely live, another man was stabbed to death. There's been a slash attack, and a robbery by men armed with a machete.
One villain used a knife to attack and rape several women, another man raped a teenage girl in an alley.

Coming after sex crimes and knife attacks this week, the mysteries:
A pair of children was found dead in a car, cause of dead undisclosed/not determined, but police think the situation is suspicious. Following a disturbance involving nigh a dozen of people, one man was found dead and two other in serious condition. The nature of their "condition" has not been discolsed, police are holding their statements concerning the deceased while awaiting his post-mortem examination.

There's been firearm offences too, one man was shot to death in a barber shop, as well as two cases of arson, an apartement building and a school were the target of arsonists.

Police managed to confiscate (over) two million dollars worth of amphetamines, the ones that weren't driving drunk that is. Two peelers are on suspension with full pay after being found driving while intoxicated, twice (the both of them).

All of this from just the sunday edition from the BBC website ... I'll say, Johnson has got his work cut out for him!

Students suspended over "T"

No, not Earl grey or Cleyon, not the sign of technology over religion from one of the greatest novels ever.

A "T" letter, simulated with their hands landed a pair of students a suspension, accused of making a reference to drug culture ... rather than the "Techno city" theme of the prom party they were at when the picture was taken ...

school PSH, not just about guns.

Antipoleez?

A new product became available some time back, antipoleez breathmints, marketed to be able to rid your mouth of alcohol or cigarette induced smells.

People are getting their drawers in a bunch, claiming that products such as this would encourage children to drink. Growing up in Belgium where the legal drinking age is just a suggestion, I never really did understand what all the fuss was about, it's PSH like that that makes me want to grab a bottle :p

Serious for a second: teach your kids to stay away from drugs, including alcohol, untill they are both old and responsible enough to handle themselves. Drink has destroyed more lifes than you can imagine. And then I don't mean that alcohol kills (which it does), no; I mean to say that drinking to excess destroys lifes, your own and others alike.

200 Million dollar black market, behind bars

Recent estimates put the valua of drugs trafficed INSIDE the UK's prisons at £100 000 000, roughly two-hundred-million-dollars!
Failing to keep drugs out of prisons has resulted in 10% of all drug seizures in England and Wales to originate from a single prison!


Who'd a thunk they wouldn't be able to keep guns of the streets either huh?

Make it illegal! Pass more laws!

A man was found out to be in possesion of $80 000 worth of heroin.

He is currently being charged with:

• possession of heroin,
• possession of heroin with intent to sell,
• possession of heroin within 1,500 feet of a school
• possession of heroin with intent to sell within 1,500 feet of a school.

Is passing a lot of legislation, making many different aspects of breaking the law punishable is paying off?

• Heroin is readily available in most large metropolitan areas and, to varying degrees, in suburban and rural markets throughout the country.
• (National drug threat assessment, 2007)

Clearly not.
Will more gun laws solve the current problems involving guns then? Another review of the UK situation will be coming up on sunday, stay tuned.

About the black market

The black market ... an amazing phenomenon to say the least. Spawned forth by the entreprising element of society, criminal capitalism at its best and before anything: oppertunism. Given a chance to make bank on a demand artificially generated by government mandate, there are plenty of people willing to risk trouble with mentioned government.

The demand can be for anything. In the Netherlands, smuggling butter was once a very profitable enterprise, much like smuggling cigarettes into the UK these days. Take any commodity, pass a law prohibiting it, and a black market will arise to supply the demand. It was the case when the US prohibited alcohol, it is the case now that many countries around the world have banned certain drugs.

And the black merket, what does it look like? Many may initially imagine a warehouse or similar building with people selling their wares, but quickly realize that is a cartoon image. The black market, it is everywhere. It is the dealer on the corner selling drugs to passers by, it is the appartment out of which a pair of crooks are selling their wares, it are the couriers of a fast-food-style drug delivery service.

The black market is a spontaneously generated organism, whose spores are everywhere and when conditions are met, they settle and grow. An inexterminable lifeform that has no home or ancorage, that has little ties in between, and can remain undetected indefinitely.

In nature, that which grows spontaneously is usually a simple lifeform, but not the black market, and especially not the suppliers to the black market. Recently, we read of semi-submarines used to smuggle drugs, before that, there was the Tennesee pot-cave, there have been many others. With no natural cave, some Britons went as far as to bury eight large cargo units to house an underground (litt&fig) Drug "factory".

The salesmen of the black market and the criminals supplying it are some of the most enterprising people to be found in this world. We will not be able to stop them, even the most opressive regimes have had to deal with smuggling, and often failed at it (underground railroad, the hiding of Jews during WWII) , the black market is eternal.

How can anyone say that we can effectively ban an object? We've spent so much money and effort, shed so much blood to stop drugs, and what do we get? Pot grown in underground shipping containers delivered to your door by what essentially amounts to a pizza delivery service for narcotics.
Do we really want to go through the same mess with guns? I'm not saying we mustn't seek to reduce the damage that gun abuse is causing, I'm saying that a head on prohibition simply will not work.
Didn't work for christianity in ancient Rome, didn't work for alcohol in the twenties, it's not working for drugs, it will not work for guns.

New Hampshire decriminalises pot.

Those in posession of a quarter ounce of po or less willnow face only a $200 fine, rather than a $2000 fine and the possibilit of a year in jail.

I personally encourage the decriminalisation of cannabis, it has worked rather well in the Netherlands, and in my homecoutry, Belgium. I don't personally smoke pot, but from a liberal point of view, I do believe people should have the right to.

Anyway, I hope NH does well with this new piece of legislation.

On people who don't obey the law.

It's long been said that few laws affect criminals, because they -per definition- break the law, they do just what they want.

Well, not just criminals, it would appear.

My country of residence, Belgium, has long been pleagued by various tyes of criminals. Being a very high-traffic country, there has always been a lot of smuggling (illicit drugs, fake cigarettes to Brittain), there's eastern European gangs focused on credit card fraud, burglary and other offences. Essentially, the courts are flooded with important criminal cases.

At some point, we the people decided that the criminals mentioned should be put higher on the courts priority list than -say- people smoking pot. Having their hands full with dangerous criminals, people arrested with cannabis simply had their trials moved back, and back, untill it expired, reasonable term for a court case was exceeded.

Logical consequence: If the police catch you with some pot -which is illegal in Belgium- and there are no minors involved, nor are you making a public disturbance, they won't file charges against you. Policemen too have bigger fish to fry than people who are already fried.

Not so in Denver! Even though the people have clearly shown that they want marihuana offences kicked down to the lowest spot on the priority list. Since then, arrests for possessing the drug have gone UP! To the great discontent of the people, the voting publics bidding is being disregarded by local law enforcement authorities, who claim obedience to federal regulations.

Is democracy being trampeled, or should the penal system come up for review?

They will never stop, a different war

I posted how gun control activists will never back down, never cease to push for even more restrictions, the same can be said about those who promote the so called war on drugs.

Banning heroin didn't work out, so acetic anhydride got scheduled too. Banning amphetamines has yet to get rid of them, so pseudo ephedrine, formic acid and methamine have been added to the -you can't have them- list.

Politicians have apparently found a new target for their anti-drug warriors: plastic baggies.
I kid you not, I came upon the story through sayuncle and TaxingTennesee, some one is actually calling out for a ban on small plastic baggies.

Refusing to admit that your venue of passing laws to curb undesired behavior is a well observed pattern of behavior in certain people. Instead of looking for alternative ways of dealing with the "problem", they insist on strengthening their original idea, which didn't work.

Did you know that a lot of coffee makers are illegal under Texan law? The pot is made out of pyrex (borosilicate glass), ownership requires licencing, and the heating element is a hotplate, which requires a licence as well.

How exactly have these laws stopped the availability of illicit drugs? They haven't.
Would you feel better, knowing that criminals can't legally get plastic baggies anymore? I don't.

Keeping illegal things off campus?

The university of Michigans botanical garden was recently found to house several cannabis plants, officuals are shocked. Pot on campus? did hell freeze over or something? who could have imagined that!?

On another note: no matter how illegal you make something, no matter how much money you trow at enforcing a policy of prohibition, no matter how valiantly you fight a war against something, people will always find a way around!

Think no knock-warrants are bad?

Police use JCB backhoe to ram into cocaine lords house.
That's right, a backhoe. They had to tear down the wall surrounding a multi-million house to swarm in.

Gotta give 'em Brittons credit: they got what they came for, seizing drugs, firearms and arresting criminals.
I think the use of a "mechanical digger" was appropriate in this came, but I certainly hope this does not become commonplace. Imagine the red tape if they'd get the address wrong ...

more from the BBC.