truesee's Blog

Police: Children left alone in feces-filled home

Wednesday, April 27, 2011 5:19 pm | Updated: 5:23 pm, Wed Apr 27, 2011.

Laurie Mason Schroeder

In what prosecutors are calling one of the worst cases of neglect they've seen, a Bristol mother has been charged with leaving her three young children alone in a feces-filled home.

           

http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/04/29/politicians.swear.list/index.html?hpt=Sbin

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/04/29/2192916/cops-raid-cupcake-baking-drug.html

International theft rings steal hundreds of vehicles in D.C. area every year

Matt Zapotoask

Washington Post

Friday, April 29, 9:22 PM

Mary Dunkley had just gotten back from church choir practice when one of the carjackers ripped open the door to her Toyota Camry. The 70-year-old retired secretary said that as she spilled onto the ground outside her Landover townhouse, the man put a gun to her head and demanded that she give up her purse.

“He was telling me, ‘Let it go. Let it go,’ ” Dunkley said. “Someone else came around real quick and jumped in the passenger seat, and they were gone in seconds.”

The men who carjacked Dunkley on March 17 were professional thieves, members of a sophisticated transatlantic car theft ring, police said. Their plan — thwarted by Prince George’s County detectives who arrested them this month — was to ship her 2009 silver Toyota thousands of miles to Lagos, Nigeria, authorities said.

While most cars are swiped for joy rides or cash from selling parts, authorities say the ring and others like it make up a complex, multimillion-dollar network.

Prince George’s police officials lauded the arrests of the ring’s high-ranking members. But they and other law enforcement authorities across the region acknowledged that the international car thieves are difficult to catch and the problem has become almost unsolvable.

“These guys are going to be replaced,” said Prince George’s Sgt. David Mohr, who works on the auto theft team.

Officials estimate that each year in the Washington area alone, hundreds of cars are stolen and shipped overseas. New York authorities announced last June that they had charged 17 people with stealing and shipping hundreds of luxury cars. Other D.C. area police officials and a spokesman for the FBI’s Baltimore Field Office said their detectives have worked similar cases.

Solomon Asare and Gabriel Awuzie, accused of being key players in the ring that stole Dunkley’s car, were arrested April 14 on car theft charges. Awuzie is scheduled to appear in court in May, and Asare in June.

“This has gone on and on and on, and it has become such an enterprise for them in the U.S.,” said Prince George’s County auto theft detective Luis Aponte. “There’s a major market for this.”

The ring’s bosses are usually based in African countries or other developing nations, where it is more difficult to find reasonably priced, mid- to high-end vehicles, authorities said. They order specific cars from middlemen in the United States, and then low-level thieves set out to get their cut.

In the Prince George’s ring, the thieves are paid according to the vehicles they carjack or steal — $1,500 for a Toyota Camry, $2,500 for a RAV4, $5,000 for a Porsche Cayenne, Aponte said. The middlemen handle the rest. They stash the stolen cars in parking lots or neighborhoods, waiting to see whether police are on their trail. Then they load the vehicles onto shipping containers bound for Africa, police said. The rings are especially prevalent in the D.C. area, police said, because of its proximity to ports.

Police say that in tracking Dunkley’s car, they were able to reach into one ring’s upper ranks.

Detectives on the Washington Area Vehicle Enforcement Team — a group of 10 auto theft investigators from Prince George’s and two from the Maryland State Police — long suspected Asare, 35, and Awuzie, 34, were involved in a ring, said Lt. Matt Meterko, who leads the group. But they were difficult to trace.

In March, detectives caught a break: Two men suspected in the carjacking of a Toyota Camry and told detectives Asare and Awuzie were scheduled to pick up a stolen car later that month.

Investigators secretly watched as a man talked to Asare in the parking lot of a Wal-Mart on Russett Green East in Laurel, then let Awuzie drive away in a Toyota Camry, Mohr said. Awuzie parked the Camry nearby, then Asare picked him up, Mohr said. They left the Camry behind, he said.

The moment was pivotal, police said, because it connected Asare and Awuzie to a car police suspected was stolen. Mohr said the Camry belonged to an Enterprise Rent-A-Car in Capitol Heights.

Detectives suspected the area near the Wal-Mart was a “cooling spot,” an area where the thieves would leave stolen cars until they were satisfied police were not trailing them.

Police began monitoring the car’s movements around-the-clock. Then, on March 29, they got their second big break: Anne Arundel County police found Dunkley’s Camry in the same Wal-Mart parking lot.

Investigators put a Global Positioning System tracker on Dunkley’s car, according to police charging documents. On March 31, a tow truck hauled the car to a warehouse on Hanna Street in Beltsville. Detectives began watching the warehouse.

Dunkley’s car and three other vehicles eventually were loaded into a faded red shipping container and hauled north, authorities said. Police stopped the load on April 13, just as it moved past the Fort McHenry Tunnel on I-95. They arrested Asare and Awuzie the next day, charging them with the theft of Dunkley’s Camry while they worked to put together a more comprehensive case.

In all, police seized six vehicles, four from the trailer and two that were in cooling spots elsewhere. Five were Toyotas, which detectives believe were requested because “they’re nice enough cars, but they’re not the high-end luxury cars that have the built-in tracking systems with them,” Mohr said.

Asare, an immigrant from Ghana, told police he lived in a modest Laurel townhome and worked as a trucker, according to court records. Awuzie, who was born in Kansas City, Mo., told police he lived in a Laurel apartment and worked at a Papa Johns Pizza, court records state. Since their arrests, both have been released on bond.

Awuzie declined to comment for this story. Asare, who also is charged with vehicle theft in Mongtomery County, did not return a written message seeking comment.

Richard Finci, Asare’s lawyer in an unrelated case, said charging documents do not identify his client as a higher-up in an international auto theft ring. He said he had not been officially retained to represent Asare in this case, and declined to comment further.

For Dunkley, it was no surprise that an international carjacking ring took her Camry. The thieves, she said, were so quick that she assumed they “must have been professional.”

The damage, Dunkley said, is lasting. She said the Camry was her “retirement car,” and she does not think she will be able to bring herself to drive it once she gets it back. She also had to replace her driver’s license and new prescription glasses, which were lost during the carjacking.

“They don’t know the problem they put people through,” Dunkley said. “It’s devastating.”

How theft rings operate:
 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/how-theft-rings-operate/2011/04/29/AFL0mpGF_graphic.html

Follow the journeys of stolen cars:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/crime-scene/post/follow-the-journeys-of-stolen-cars/2011/04/29/AFx0PgHF_blog.html

http://chattahbox.com/us/2011/04/29/the-trump-doctrine-revealed-listen-you-mother-fers/

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/8-Year-Old-Brings-Gun-Sells-it-at-Queens-School-120901834.html

                                 Maurice and Pia Kirchberg

                   Photo courtesy Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office

04/25/2011

Don Germaise

ABC Action News

Oil companies are making more money and less fuel

Refiners including Exxon Mobil are raking in profits while producing less gasoline and diesel in the U.S. than usual for this time of year. They're also exporting more to foreign countries. With oil prices rising, that makes for sticker shock at the pump.

Valero Energy, the nation’s biggest independent oil refiner, had “record exports coming from the United States” during the last three months of 2010, Chief Executive Bill Klesse recently told investors and analysts. Above, Valero's Wilmington refinery in October. (Christina House, For The Times / April 29, 2011)

Ronald D. White, Los Angeles Times

April 28, 2011, 7:08 p.m.

Gasoline prices are skyrocketing — and so are oil company profits.

Exxon Mobil Corp. earned nearly $11 billion in the first three months of the year, a rollicking 69% increase over its performance for the same period last year. That's on sales of $114 billion.

It's the same story for the other big oil companies. Royal Dutch Shell turned a profit of $6.3 billion in the first quarter, and BP — despite lingering costs from the Gulf Coast oil spill — made $7.1 billion.

What they aren't making is fuel, at least not in normal quantities. And that's a key factor in their reinvigorated financial performance.

Despite increasing demand, refiners are producing less gasoline and diesel in the U.S. than usual for this time of year. They're also exporting more to foreign countries.

Add rising oil prices, and you get the kind of sticker shock at the gas pump that some analysts say could challenge 2008's all-time highs — with regular gas already averaging about $3.88 a gallon in the U.S. and $4.22 in California, more than a month before the summer driving season kicks in.

Motorists and consumer advocates are outraged at high pump prices and say refineries need to increase gasoline supplies to reduce fuel costs.

"This is a page torn right out of the handbook of gouge-onomics," said Charles Langley, senior gasoline analyst at the Utility Consumers' Action Network in San Diego. "We call it the law of supply and demand: They supply less product and demand more money for it."

Oil makes up about two-thirds of the cost of a gallon of gas, so expensive oil always turns into expensive fuel. But as for-profit entities, refiners use a variety of means to ensure that they keep as much of that windfall as possible.

The nation's refineries are operating at about 81% of their production capacity, Energy Department statistics show. That compares with a 20-year historic average of about 89% for this time of year, according to department records.

Part of that can be explained by the increasing use of ethanol, usually made from corn, which is added after gasoline is refined. Ethanol boosts fuel supply without increasing petroleum consumption just as adding crackers to meatloaf makes more dinner with less beef.

A bigger factor, some experts say, is refiners' business strategy: Having only recently returned to strong profits and leery of potential erosion in consumption, the companies are playing it cautiously.

"They aren't going to try to match production to demand. You aren't going to see anyone running full out right now," said Brian L. Milne, refined-fuels editor for Telvent DTN, which provides commodity price information to businesses.

And here's another piece to the fuel-price puzzle: Refiners are exporting large amounts of gasoline and diesel to foreign buyers willing to pay a premium. Demand for refined products such as gasoline is expected to go back into decline in the U.S. by the end of 2011 because of increased use of alternative fuels, among other things, so refinery companies are looking to broaden their reach with new customers overseas, particularly with diesel fuel.

"U.S. refineries have been sending 15% to 20% of their production overseas for about a year now," said Andrew Lipow, president of consulting firm Lipow Oil Associates in Houston. "Demand for diesel is strong in Central America and South America and Europe and other parts of the world." That's more than double the rate of exports in 2007, he said.

Valero Energy Corp., the nation's biggest independent oil refiner, had "record exports coming from the United States" during the last three months of 2010, Chief Executive Bill Klesse recently told investors and analysts. The San Antonio company's export pace declined somewhat this year because of refinery maintenance.

"We send diesel fuel to South America. We've been sending gasoline to Latin American countries. So there's a lot of change that's happened in this business," Klesse said. In the first quarter, Valero earned $98 million, reversing a year-earlier loss of $113 million.

Energy companies say fuel prices are determined by supply, demand and competition, and that the main culprit for the current run-up is crude prices, which rose more than 30% in the last year because of conflicts in North Africa and the Middle East as well as strengthening world economies.

The American Petroleum Institute, the oil company trade group, said its own statistics showed that refiners are doing their job, delivering 4% more gasoline in the first quarter than in the same period last year.

"We are moving more product than last year and supporting the economic recovery," said Rayola Dougher, the group's senior economic advisor. "The refinery sector is more than keeping pace with that."

At the same time, Energy Department data show a drawdown of more than 18 million barrels in the nation's gasoline stocks this year to 205.6 million barrels, including a drop of 2.5 million barrels in the most recent week.

Valero spokesman Bill Day said production levels are a straightforward matter of supply and demand, and currently U.S. demand is constrained by the pace of the economic recovery.

"Demand in the U.S. is beginning to recover, but it's not recovering strongly," Day said.

This year, oil prices have been on a tear much as in 2008, boosting oil company profits and fuel prices. That was when retail gasoline reached a record average of $4.114 a gallon nationally and $4.588 in California. Averages this month have been higher than for any April since the Energy Department began tracking weekly fuel data in 1990.

The refinery industry "has made a comeback, absolutely," said Fadel Gheit, senior energy analyst for Oppenheimer & Co., noting that refining stocks gained 50% last year and have since maintained a similar trajectory.

But refinery profits can be precarious, he said, and may be squeezed if consumers balk at paying high fuel prices.

"This is not a golden age for refining," Gheit said. "This will come to an end."

As recently as 2007, industry executives thought that they were in such a golden age, when U.S. demand looked to be on a constantly rising curve. But after 2008's record fuel prices and the recession reduced fuel consumption, energy companies changed their tactics.

They are shedding capacity in the U.S. through refinery sales. Investments in their U.S. refineries are geared around equipment upgrades, not expansion. And when they do talk about increasing production to meet rising demand, they mean overseas, not in the U.S., and they mean making more diesel, not gasoline.

"These companies see their future earnings growth overseas, not in the U.S., where demand is still rather flat," Lipow said.

For motorists, the proof is at the pump.

Los Angeles resident James Fong said he was bothered by growing oil company earnings even though he owns two of the most fuel-efficient cars around: a 2001 Honda Insight and a 2010 Toyota Prius.

"I look at other people and see that they are only getting half a tank of gas because that is all they can afford," said the 54-year-old AT&T systems technician. "It's not good for us, but they are going to do whatever they can to make the money."

"I wish," Fong said, "I was in the oil business."

 http://www.wreg.com/videobeta/d00f6f3f-bc66-4e6a-9142-1f687e658955/News/Fake-Check-Scam

http://www.kgw.com/news/Keizer-Sign-Sparks-Outcry-120924899.html

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Education/2011/0428/Homeless-child-enrolled-in-wrong-school-What-should-happen-to-him

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2011/04/28/2011-04-28_is_donald_trump_a_racist_whoopi_goldberg_joy_behar_bob_schieffer_jesse_jackson_s.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/click-track/post/beyonce-drops-new-video-for-first-ladys-lets-move-campaign/2011/04/27/AFVxiuxE_blog.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1380867/Working-mother-Kathy-Vitzthum-graduates-19-years-college.html?ito=feeds-newsxml