A federal civil suit filed July 2009 alleges unknown Oakland Police Officers along with an Alameda County Sheriff's Deputy kidnapped a House of 420 member putting her in the trunk of a police car in a conspiracy to frame another House of 420 member with crimes.

The member that was kidnapped gave a written declaration of what happened to her and corroborated her story several times in subsequent interviews with police personnel, yet remarkably the case is up for dismissal. The presiding judge is a former Oakland Police officer.

This is not the first such case against Oakland Police Dept. Allen v City of Oakland case (CIV - 04599 TEH Northern District) involved similar misconduct.

It appears crimes for which ordinary citizens would be facing life in prison are trying to be swept under the rug in one of the most disgusting cases of police misconduct and abuse of power ever.

The community should be concerned. Time to stand up.

Tiger Woods has been making history on and off the course since he joined the PGA Tour in 1996. First up was a record $40 million contract from Nike. The following year he won the Masters by a record 12 strokes, becoming the youngest winner ever and first black player to take the title. His career has been packed full of accomplishments, including major titles (14), annual money titles (9) and Player of the Year awards (9).

Now Woods can add one more accolade to his trophy case: the first athlete to earn $1 billion. Our calculations show that the $10 million bonus Woods earned winning this year's FedEx Cup title nudged him over the $1 billion mark in career earnings, beating out Michael Jordan and Michael Schumacher.

Forbes has been tracking athlete earnings since before Tiger turned pro. Woods had earned a cumulative $895 million going into 2009, by our estimates, from prize money, appearance fees, endorsements, bonuses and his golf course design business. If you add his $10.5 million in 2009 prize money, the FedEx bonus and his take so far this year from his more than $100 million in annual off-the-course earnings, Woods' career earnings are now 10 figures.

The article points out that only Woods's accountant truly knows if he's a billionaire, but one thing is certain: Tiger's money-making potential won't slow down anytime soon.

The most stunning part is that Woods is only 33 years old--he might have 15 years of competitive golf left in him, and 30-plus years of designing courses. This is only the first billion for Woods.

Woods has been the highest-paid American athlete for years, and the competition isn't even close. In this year's Fortunate 50, SI's annual ranking, Woods's estimated total earnings were nearly $100 million, far exceeding Phil Mickelson in second ($53 million) and LeBron James in third ($42.4 million). Amazingly, Woods made even more the year before, according to SI -- $128 million.

Youtube is NOT your friend. While some of you are out there foolishly promoting 'youtube' while youtube deletes your videos, just remember you are also therefore promoting what is most likely the largest 'N' word database in the world and on the Internet. Type the 'n' word in youtubes' search box, you will get over 24,000 results not including the millions of 'comments' on videos by youtube users. Now that's viral!!!

As a result, you try to watch videos on youtube and quickly notice use of the 'n' word freely and maliciously but youtube does nothing in response. Maybe because youtube is too busy deleting 'booty shaking' videos and other trivial distractions so they don't have to deal with more important issues.

House of 420 social network has filtered the 'n' word since it began in 2007 - certainly a progressive, sophisticated site like youtube could do the same.

This is NOT a First Amendment, free speech issue. This is a decency and responsibility issue. Youtube is essentially providing a platform for hate & racism - NOT a good business nor social model.

Shame on youtube!

Posted on Feb 17, 2009

By Amy Goodman

  As many as 5,000 children in Pennsylvania have been found guilty, and up to 2,000 of them jailed, by two corrupt judges who received kickbacks from the builders and owners of private prison facilities that benefited. The two judges pleaded guilty in a stunning case of greed and corruption that is still unfolding. Judges Mark A. Ciavarella Jr. and Michael T. Conahan received $2.6 million in kickbacks while imprisoning children who often had no access to a lawyer. The case offers an extraordinary glimpse into the shameful private prison industry that is flourishing in the United States.

  Take the story of Jamie Quinn. When she was 14 years old, she was imprisoned for almost a year. Jamie, now 18, described the incident that led to her incarceration:

  “I got into an argument with one of my friends. And all that happened was just a basic fight. She slapped me in the face, and I did the same thing back. There [were] no marks, no witnesses, nothing. It was just her word against my word.”

  Jamie was placed in one of the two controversial facilities, PA Child Care, then bounced around to several other locations. The 11-month imprisonment had a devastating impact on her. She told me: “People looked at me different when I came out, thought I was a bad person, because I was gone for so long. My family started splitting up ... because I was away and got locked up. I’m still struggling in school, because the schooling system in facilities like these places [are] just horrible.”

  She began cutting herself, blaming medication that she was forced to take: “I was never depressed, I was never put on meds before. I went there, and they just started putting meds on me, and I didn’t even know what they were. They said if I didn’t take them, I wasn’t following my program.” She was hospitalized three times.

  Jamie Quinn is just one of thousands that these two corrupt judges locked up. The Philadelphia-based Juvenile Law Center got involved when Hillary Transue was sent away for three months for posting a Web site parodying the assistant principal at her school. Hillary clearly marked the Web page as a joke. The assistant principal didn’t find it funny, apparently, and Hillary faced the notoriously harsh Judge Ciavarella.

  As Bob Schwartz of the Juvenile Law Center told me: “Hillary had, unknown to her, signed a paper, her mother had signed a paper, giving up her right to a lawyer. That made the 90-second hearing that she had in front of Judge Ciavarella pretty much of a kangaroo court.” The JLC found that in half of the juvenile cases in Luzerne County, defendants had waived their right to an attorney. Judge Ciavarella repeatedly ignored recommendations for leniency from both prosecutors and probation officers. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court heard the JLC’s case, then the FBI began an investigation, which resulted in the two judges entering guilty-plea agreements last week for tax evasion and wire fraud.

  They are expected to serve seven years in federal prison. Two separate class-action lawsuits have been filed on behalf of the imprisoned children.

  This scandal involves just one county in the U.S., and one relatively small private prison company. According to The Sentencing Project, “the United States is the world’s leader in incarceration with 2.1 million people currently in the nation’s prisons or jails—a 500 percent increase over the past thirty years.” The Wall Street Journal reports that “[p]rison companies are preparing for a wave of new business as the economic downturn makes it increasingly difficult for federal and state government officials to build and operate their own jails.” For-profit prison companies like the Corrections Corporation of America and GEO Group (formerly Wackenhut) are positioned for increased profits. It is still not clear what impact the just-signed stimulus bill will have on the private prison industry (for example, the bill contains $800 million for prison construction, yet billions for school construction were cut out).

  Congress is considering legislation to improve juvenile justice policy, legislation the American Civil Liberties Union says is “built on the clear evidence that community-based programs can be far more successful at preventing youth crime than the discredited policies of excessive incarceration.”

  Our children need education and opportunity, not incarceration. Let the kids of Luzerne County imprisoned for profit by corrupt judges teach us a lesson. As young Jamie Quinn said of her 11-month imprisonment, “It just makes me really question other authority figures and people that we’re supposed to look up to and trust.”
 
  Denis Moynihan contributed research to this column.
 
  Amy Goodman is the host of “Democracy Now!,” a daily international TV/radio news hour airing on more than 700 stations in North America. She was awarded the 2008 Right Livelihood Award, dubbed the “Alternative Nobel” prize, and received the award in the Swedish Parliament in December.

  © 2009 Amy Goodman

  Distributed by King Features Syndicate