Tag: Prison

Upcoming political events in the Bay Area. Installation ceremonies begin at 7 a.m. Saturday, with installation itself starting at 10 a.m. Take-down from 4:30-8 p.m. Sunday. Immigrant rights protest: Sponsored by San Mateo Peace Action and the Raging Grannies. Collection plate proceeds will be given to the Oakland LGBTQ Center. Supervisor candidate forum: San Francisco District Six supervisor candidates Matt Haney, Christine Johnson and Sonja Trauss take part in a forum, sponsored by the East Cut Community Benefit District. 6:30-8 p.m., 101 Second St., San Francisco. 6:30-8 p.m., 2050 Center St., Berkeley. A complete list of rallies in the Bay Area and elsewhere in California is here. 1 p.m., San Francisco Main Library’s Koret Auditorium, 100 Larkin St. More information is here. Laborfest: 25th annual monthlong festival of labor-themed events, forums and cultural performances begins.

Private prisons account for 20 percent of all federal prisoners held in detention and their profits are soaring in the wake of immigration arrests. Brendan Greely and Tim O’Brien sit down with Stephanie Ruhle to discuss how lobbying efforts by…

Two weeks after Robert Mueller's prosecutors dropped new accusations of witness tampering on him, US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson Friday revoked Manafort's bail, which allowed him out on house arrest. The judge emphasized to Manafort how she could not make enough rulings to keep him from speaking improperly with witnesses, after he had used multiple text messaging apps and called a potential witness on an Italian cell phone. Manafort also entered a not guilty plea to two additional charges levied against him last week, for witness tampering and conspiracy to obstruct justice. In total, Manafort faces seven criminal charges in DC federal court. In her wind-up to her order, Berman Jackson also gave a brief nod to the bitter environment around the case. It didn't come through, according to the court filings. Prosecutors have argued all along the jet-setting political consultant was a significant flight risk. The prosecutors appeared to agree with the plan, according to court filings. The witness tampering allegations, which also resulted in new criminal charges, were enough Friday for him to lose his house arrest privileges. The judge has allowed him to travel a few times for special exceptions, such as to his father-in-law's funeral on Long Island and his godson's baptism in Virginia.

Against that backdrop, federal prisoner number 40892-424 this week penned a column in the conservative opinion pages of The Wall Street Journal, owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch who is tight with Trump. Another top adviser and fundraiser went to prison in corruption schemes that served as a precursor to Blagojevich’s own indictment. "I have nobody to blame but myself for my stupidity and actions and words and what I thought I could do. "Here I am in my sixth year of a 14-year prison sentence for the routine practice of attempting to raise campaign funds while governor," he wrote. Five of those counts were later tossed on appeal, but the crimes for which he still stands convicted include: Trying to shake down the CEO of Children’s Memorial Hospital for $25,000 in campaign cash in exchange for a hike in state reimbursements for pediatric specialists. Among wiretaps played at trial were some that captured Blagojevich discussing a scheme to appoint a longtime political adversary to the post, then U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., in exchange for $1.5 million in political donations. "I’m in prison for practicing politics," read the headline on the article by the former Illinois governor. Blagojevich and his legal team also made the "politics as usual, nothing to see here" argument during his trials, but such claims were soundly rejected by federal jurors. Much of the evidence presented at those trials stemmed from court-ordered wiretaps on which Blagojevich was heard scheming to carry out the very crimes for which he was convicted. Illinois has certainly suffered its share of public corruption, and skepticism about politicians abounds.

On Tuesday, results from a hard-fought election in south India’s Karnataka state were announced, showing neither prime minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), nor the incumbent Congress party, had won enough seats to govern outright. In response, Congress and a smaller regional ally ordered at least 40 of their MPs onto buses, where they were shipped to the five-star Eagleton Resort and locked inside – beyond the reach of BJP negotiators. “You build a wall around your legislators so that the other party doesn’t encroach on them,” says BK Chandrashekhar, a Congress leader and former minister in several Karnataka state governments. Protecting them, but also making sure they don’t escape.” The aftermath of Tuesday’s hung parliament has shown Indian politics at its rawest. Congress alleges BJP officials soon flooded the hotel trying to make contact with legislators. In India, ideology has been cast to the wind. Ideas are simply never part of the equation.” Discrimination kills 230,000 girls under five in India each year, study shows Read more Some members of Indian parliaments regularly switch parties at election time depending on the political winds. Karnataka is a particularly egregious example of the trend: a decade ago about 63% of of MPs in the state were “crorepatis” – worth more than 1 crore, or £100,000. This year 97% of MPs boast that wealth, and half are worth ten times more. So when elections are tight, instead of appealing to loyalty or ideology, party officials prefer to herd their MPs into resorts, where they wile days away at the buffet and pool.

Malaysia's king has agreed to pardon a politician whose case has gripped national politics for two decades, says new PM Mahathir Mohamad. Anwar Ibrahim, once considered a potential future leader, was jailed on charges of corruption and sodomy after falling out with the government. But Mr Mahathir, the PM under which he was first jailed, just won an election on a pledge of freeing him. He has indicated he will hand power to Anwar within a few years. "It is going to be a full pardon which of course means that he should not only be pardoned, he should be released immediately when he is pardoned. Both he and Anwar were formerly in power, as part of the BN, as prime minister and deputy respectively. Though sodomy is illegal in conservative Muslim Malaysia people are seldom convicted for it, so his case was widely seen as an attempt by the government to remove a political threat. In 2004 his conviction was overturned and he led the opposition to unprecedented gains - though not victory - in the 2008 and 2013 general elections. It remains unclear when the pardon will be issued, and Mr Mahathir warned his supporters that the process of Anwar becoming an MP again so he can take on the leadership "might take a long time". Mahathir Mohamad, the autocratic strongman who turned on his chosen successor Anwar Ibrahim, is now allied with him and seeking his release, having deposed Najib Razak, another one-time Mahathir protégé.

She's free to grow out her hair, travel the world, and spend time with whomever she likes. Far from it: The Oklahoma native has decided to make an unlikely bid for the U.S. Senate in her adopted state of Maryland. She lives in North Bethesda, not far from where she stayed with an aunt while awaiting trial. "The rise of authoritarianism is encroaching in every aspect of life, whether it's government or corporate or technological," Manning told The Associated Press during an interview at her home in an upscale apartment tower. On the walls of her barely furnished living room hang Obama's commutation order, and photos of U.S. anarchist Emma Goldman and British playwright Oscar Wilde. Manning's longshot campaign for the June 26 primary would appear to be one of the more unorthodox U.S. Senate bids in recent memory, and the candidate is operating well outside the party's playbook. She says she doesn't, in fact, even consider herself a Democrat, but is motivated by a desire to shake up establishment Democrats who are "caving in" to President Donald Trump's administration. "It feels to me almost like it's part of a book tour — that this is her moment after being released from prison," said Dana Beyer, a transgender woman who leads the Gender Rights Maryland nonprofit and is a Democratic candidate for state senate. Manning is indeed working on a book about her dramatic life. She told attendees she's still struggling to adjust to life after prison and hasn't gotten used to her celebrity status yet.