Councilwoman Inna Vernikov, a highly educated and accomplished young woman who is an attorney representing the Brighton Beach area, was doing an interview recently when some random crackhead with a criminal record walked up and kissed her.

Now she's pressing charges.  Will they ever stop though?  I think it's good that they're not naming his name.  Because let's face it, she's beautiful, bright, and educated.  And that's exactly why some crackhead dirtbag who doesn't wash his butt walks up and plants one on her during an interview, isn't it?

Isn't that why the dickhead from Spain had to kiss the women's captain right after they won, and then called it consensual?  It's their way of peeing in the corners of everything we do.

As both a veteran paramedic and a person disabled by mental health issues, everything about the below video sickens me.  I warn you it's terrible to watch.  The channel creator did excellent research on breaking down the legal issues.  I will actually transcribe everything former Officer Skelton said to the young man who was having a bad day with his schizophrenia, Mr. Thomas, when this anger-management case went off on him.

This sort of thing happens in departments that allow them to happen.  It makes me suspect they probably have multiple Holtzclaws running around, and they don't care about that, either.  Because when the lieutenant arrived on scene, he wasn't bothered by the despicable, obviously illegal behavior of multiple officers.

THE QUICK AND DIRTY:

The Lieutenant and the partner each got three-day suspensions.

The primary aggressor got fired, sued, and is facing a felony charge to which he has pled not guilty.

This portion is a verbatim transcript, omitting nothing former Officer Skelton said to the mentally ill citizen:

• Not now, come on.  You're under arrest.  I said you're under arrest, motherfucker.
• Get the fuck over here.  Get your motherfucking ass over here.
• Hands on the car.  Hands on the car, dickhead.
• Put your hands on the hood.  Have you ever had a real job?  Okay.  Yeah, you're about to have some work done.  [emphasis added]
• Hands behind your back, you're under arrest.
• This way.  [Where we going?]  Jail.  [For what?]  Vandalism.  [What I vandalize?]  The inside of the store.  You vandalized the inside of the store.  Sit.  Good.  [Other conversation]  No.  [Why not?] Cause I said so.
• Put your feet in.   Eat a dick, motherfucker.

Conversation between two cops:

• Lobotomy's sounding nicer, isn't it?
• Yeah, sure is.  Sure is.

I can't exactly hear what's said next.  The subject kicks the car door from inside. 

• SKELTON:  You kick my car again, I'm gonna foam you.  You understand me?  I'm gonna spray the fuck out of you, you worthless piece of incestuous shit.

Can you imagine how they used to talk to people BEFORE bodycams?  Also this person was cooperative the whole time despite his ongoing mental health problems, which these police were aware of because they had taken him to the psychiatric hospital earlier in the day.  

All this over vandalism.  No person was injured, only money.  The content creator points out that Officer Skelton has escalated to this level without even going into the store to verify that he had actually done anything, on the shopkeeper's word alone, no investigation at all. 

• Skelton calls dispatch to say that he's about to deploy pepper foam.
• He opens the door and sprays Mr. Thomas in the back seat, then rapidly shuts the door again.  Goes around the other side and sprays him again, closing the door.  They prepare to place him in a rib hobble.
• The cop threatens Mr. Thomas not to kick him again as he's placed into a rib hobble, and he replies, "No, sir.  Please put the window down."
• It's their departmental policy to relieve people's suffering after they're pepper sprayed, especially if they're entirely compliant as this person was.
• SKELTON:  For you?  Hell no.  Not after that.  You're gonna make me have to treat you like that after I tried to be good to you the first time, tried to take you somewhere to get you some help?  Then you're gonna make me be an asshole, now you're gonna ask me for a favor?  I don't think so."

Okay, I can only imagine the beatings the wife of someone like this might take.  First of all, butthole,  not doing him a favor by (a) taking him to the mental-health facility because hey, he's mentally ill which is why he allegedly causes problems at the store.  And (b) it's your department's policy to relieve him after he's sprayed, and not a favor you're doing him.  Lastly (c) that's what they're paying you to do, not a favor of yours. That citizen owes you nothing but the compliance he's been giving, you scumbag menace to the world.

• Skelton's use of pepper was excessive under his department's guidelines in the first place as the content creator discusses. 
• SKELTON:  He wanted me to roll the window down.  I probably should. 
• Other garbage cop who was okay with it all:  He was calling you "sir" after that point.
• SKELTON:  Yeah, he was. 

They do a little shop talk while the hobbled man suffers in the back of the closed vehicle.  They discuss that the one has never deployed his spray before, and whether they have "enough for a felony."

• SKELTON:  "That's the pepper doing its work."

I'm glad this person was both fired and sued.  Watching them stand around smiling and discussing potential charges for this young, mentally ill person while he suffers in the back of that closed vehicle makes me want to scream.  The money Mr. Thomas got wasn't enough.

Mr. Skelton is facing a felony and has pled not guilty.

Administrative (employee-level) charges were dismissed against Officers Sharman and Halteman.  Officer Bittick and Lt. McGowan each received three-day suspensions.

COMPARE AND CONTRAST

WARNING:  Small children get put through the wringer over nothing.

Meanwhile, check out this excellent police officer.  He went to arrest this neighborhood menace at her home.  She escalated the situation to involve both her grandmother and her children. 

Unfortunately her grandmother shut the door on the police officer's foot.  He was very cool about it.  The worst he called her was, "You idiot," while begging her to release his foot from the fully-closed door. 

When the backup arrives to arrest the grandmother, an officer hurls her to the ground by her wrist.  The cop she just closed the door on immediately urges his coworker to be gentle with the old woman.  He understands that her PITA granddaughter has brought her into a situation that she didn't really have time to think through.  Unlike Mr. Skelton and his morally bankrupt former coworkers, this officer has the appropriate temperament to do this job.

The Daily Beast:

"TOKYO, Japan—Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department (TMPD) announced on Aug. 1 that three people had been arrested in Tokyo’s Toshima ward for running an extortion ring—and targeting some unusual victims.

The cops might have expected the Japanese public to herald the arrests as a victory for law and order, but the alleged criminals are being hailed as heroes. That’s because in this case, the suspects are accused of targeting men they suspect of taking non-consensual photos of women around Ikebukuro Station in northern Tokyo."

Being a socially marginalized person means that I consistently have unpopular opinions.  And here I go again.

If you read the linked article, you will see that the three men who were arrested were seen escorting other men to ATMs at this station on other occasions, presumably after catching them doing upskirt photography on non-consenting women.

Fuck them.

The article goes on to explain that there's a very lucrative market for such videos in Japan, not only on the internet but in local shops. 

These alleged extortionists were keeping all the money for themselves.  They weren't in any way part of the solution of sexual exploitation of women.  As I see it, they were merely profit skimmers, co-scumbags. 

They didn't give the money to the women who were preyed upon.  They didn't stop the creepers from doing their behavior, didn't report them to the police.  They only dipped their fingers into the pie, exactly as la cosa nostra would do in that situation.  They found an angle to benefit themselves, and exploited it.  They were caught when one of their targets balked at paying them, and instead went to the police, despite being a criminal himself.

Because of the combination of capitalism and rape culture, I don't expect any of this to change.  Just like in America, the Japanese police are often bad actors in sexual violence against women.

Mainichi:

"According to the National Police Agency, existing statistics going back to 2014 show about 20 police officers and police personnel [in Japan] have been subject to disciplinary action every year for secretly taking women's upskirt photos with smartphones and other similar criminal offenses. The total number of such people reached 148 in the seven years up to 2020. "

From AP:

"MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A formerly well-connected GOP donor convicted of giving teenage girls gifts, alcohol and money in exchange for sex was sentenced Wednesday to 21 years in prison on sex trafficking charges.

Anton “Tony” Lazzaro was found guilty in March by a federal jury of seven counts involving “commercial sex acts” with five girls ages 15 and 16 in 2020, when Lazzaro was 30. The charges carried mandatory minimum sentences of 10 years with a maximum of life in prison.

Prosecutors had requested a 30-year sentence for Lazzaro."

...

"Lazzaro’s indictment in 2021 touched off a political firestorm that led to the downfall of Jennifer Carnahan as chair of the Republican Party of Minnesota."

I really wish that sexual assault could stop being politicized.  I wish we were people who get harmed, and not improvised explosive devices for every agenda everyone has.

"His co-defendant, Gisela Castro Medina, who was 19 at the time, formerly led the College Republicans chapter at the University of St. Thomas. She pleaded guilty to two counts last year. She testified against Lazzaro and faces sentencing in September.

Prosecutors argued during his trial that Lazzaro enlisted Castro Medina, who he initially paid for sex, to recruit other teenagers — preferably minors — who were white, small, vulnerable or “broken.” He often sent cars to take the girls to his luxury penthouse condo at the Hotel Ivy in downtown Minneapolis, they said."

It's very classic for guys like him to seek out vulnerable, "broken" girls from bad families. The fact that he also liked them physically small is just a tribute to his personal heroism.  There's nothing surprising about any of that.  I don't know how he will get his brows sculpted in prison.  Really sad for him.

WARNING:  I have no sympathy for this person and am not feeling kind about it.  I say this as someone who is permanently disabled by an anxiety disorder.

Bodycam footage is one of my favorite things for so many reasons.  It lets everybody see what the police are doing in real life, which is the best thing of all.  I truly believe that our progress in racial justice in recent years has all happened because of the videos that now exist of everything.

But bodycam also allows people to see what's actually happening in America, not in the curated, heavily edited copaganda form of old.  Here we can see what police work is really like, for better or for worse.   And this cop did an amazing job.

Granted, we only get the videos that someone has done a Freedom of Information Act request on and then publicly posted.  But in general I find them chock-a-block with information, a true learning experience about America.  I can see the level of training and professionalism that exists in different agencies, what kind of calls they're running, and what kind of mutual aid they get from other agencies.  These are very much like running paramedic calls.

I realize that I'm probably a bad person, but the above video made me belly laugh.  That lady is an obnoxious, immature knucklehead.  She's very much in need of the kind of time out that the criminal justice system can provide.  Her own mother kicked her out.  And the police did us all a great favor by arresting her that day.  But here are a few of the highlights of this video that I found remarkable:

• This began with a very minor incident, someone who didn't turn from a turn-only lane.  Should be no big --  if you're reasonably sane or cooperative as a white woman in America under normal circumstances.
• When he asks her to roll her window down all the way, she rolls it down just a tiny crack.  We can see smoke pouring out.  Her reply:  "I don't have to if I'm in my own car."  LOL!!!
• I have learned from watching bodycam videos that people who are going to talk themselves into getting arrested when they would otherwise not have had a problem, have a few mantras in common, things you'll hear over and over again:

1. "I don't have to!" (they do)
2. "I know my rights!"  (they don't)
3. "I didn't do nothing!" (they did)
4. "This is my house/car" (nobody cares)

• This crackpot's concept is that she doesn't have to roll the window all the way down because (a) it's her car and (b) the cop didn't say "please."  She's at the emotional maturity level where she believes the police are some other kids in her kindergarten class who have to use the magic word with her. 
• Even I can see the smoke coming out the window, clear in the video, much less in person.  And it's not smell-o-vision.
• She doesn't have her driver's license. She says it's in her car.  But what she says here doesn't really make sense.  I truly don't understand people who get behind the wheel and don't have their license readily available.   But these videos are full of them.
• "Do you have any marijuana, guns, drugs, anything like that?"  [Long pause] [Eyes shift around] LOL!!!  Oh my God, this broad!  I literally belly laughed both times I watched this.
• Admits she has a gun.   "Do you have a CCW permit?"  Has never heard of that.  The hits just keep on coming with this woman.  I'm going to stop calling her names now because my grandma wouldn't approve.  Her life is its own punishment.
• Seriously this woman has never heard of a concealed carry permit and doesn't understand the concept when asked by the police about the gun she's concealing.  Later in the video she disputes that she's concealing it because she admitted to having it when asked.  The officer had to explain to her that it was inside her purse, inside the car, and that he couldn't clearly see it.  Remember how she didn't want to even roll those tinted windows down? 
• This cop is so patient with this woman throughout the encounter.  I'm not even going to go blow-by-blow through the rest of the video because really I do want to strangle her the more I watch this.  I want to bludgeon her.  The police officer coaches her breathing while arresting her.  His department doesn't issue him a binky in case of this kind of emergency.
• As soon as she admits to having a gun, her African-American boyfriend, who apparently lives on Earth 1, says -- without even being asked -- "I'm putting my hands on the dashboard" and does so.  See?  I wonder why that is.  I bet he knows what "CCW" means.  He, unlike his girlfriend, immediately understands that not cooperating with the police in this situation could be very much life-or-death, especially for him.  This woman is extremely dangerous for him to hang around with.  Maybe he can buy her a monogrammed clue for Christmas, because she does not have a single one in her entire inventory.
• She is found to be carrying a gun for which she does not have a permit.  There is a round in the chamber! SHE HAS A GUN WITH A ROUND IN THE CHAMBER.
• Why did she buy it?  "I just thought it would be cool to have."  That's the first reason she gave, and the one that I believe.  She says her mother kicked her out for buying it, which I think is a sign that she should have heeded about the direction of her life.  She later says a bunch of blah blah about someone threatened her, she has anxieties, and she's also a survivor of gun violence.  I fart in her general direction.
• Most astonishingly, she claims that she wants to be a security guard!  I cannot think of anyone less qualified to be a security guard except Jeremy DeWitte or maybe Ethan Crumbley.  Really, someone rolling around with a round in the chamber, who does not understand the concept of "CCW," who has a panic attack when talking to the police, merciful baby Jesus should never even think about being a security guard.
• Overall the police did us all a big favor getting this person and her gun off the road.  It was a much-needed intervention in her life.  Hopefully this incident will prevent her from ever being hired as a security guard.  And luckily her boyfriend didn't get shot because of her bad driving.

People who have the luxury of never being sexually assaulted were shocked when the #MeToo Movement got co-opted by mainstream America.  I'm really glad that phase is over with.  Because I couldn't stand everyone saying, "Wow, it's shocking what rich, powerful, white men get away with!"

Because really they could drop the first three qualifiers.  In my experience, in America men pretty much get to do as they please almost across the board without consequences.  That's unless the police and prosecutors happen to want to stitch them up, like with the Central Park Five or West Memphis Three.  If they feel like they need to punish somebody, it could be anyone who can't fight back, like poor Junius Stinney.  But the person who actually did the sex crime has no worries. 

Like Larry Nassar, this Maryland situation is another one where some nobody of a schlub, some schmoe who would be very easy to replace, a guy who doesn't make all that much money and is nothing special, has allegedly been allowed to just do whatever he wants for years.  This one is named Joel Biedleman.

His shitty boss is named Monifa B. McKnight.  May she be working at Walmart real soon.

Just like with Larry Nassar, all Biedleman has to do is say, "No, I didn't," over and over again, and the people he works for say, "all is well then" and give him a promotion.   That's literally his only defense here, same as Nassar.  No matter how many people contradict him, Biedleman just keeps saying, "No, they're all wrong, I didn't do it."  And Nassar is still saying all he did was physical therapy.  But at least Nassar is in jail.  Monifa McKnight probably would've promoted him.

The Washington Post report details:

• A 2022-2023 MCPS staff survey asking "How positive is the climate that leadership sets at your school?" revealed that over 40% answered "Not at all," the second-worst of any MCPS middle school.  Monifa McKnight:  "Great job, Joel!  Take more money!"
  
• Nine teachers who mentioned his abuse as their reason for quitting
  
• 18 reports of misconduct against him by parents, teachers, and union stewards since 2016
  
• A former PTA president who requested a change of schools for her children after he told her daughter "not to be a whore" like her friend
  
• Another parent who was so concerned about his frequently calling her daughter into his office to interrogate her about her clothing and appearance that she hired an attorney
  
• An assembly where he called the girls in his student body "hos and thots," which he later denied despite a dozen outraged teacher eyewitnesses
  
• An in-service on professional attire in which 24 teachers claim he said, "Camel toe is not allowed," which Biedleman denies.  Remember folks, all he has to say is, "No" and they're all liars who have to go away
  
• One teacher who was offered an assistant principal job.  Then  he sent her text messages asking for sex.  When he sent her a text saying he was on her way to his house, She made it clear in no uncertain terms not to come,  and reminded him that they were "just friends," which she felt was "career suicide."  Twelve days later she learned that she was not in the selection pool.  She was texted 400 times, including pressure for sexual favors, between being offered the job and being rejected for it.
  
• Told one teacher she looked like she "pegged her husband" and did butt stuff
  
• And many more issues, read the linked article.
  

"Until last week, MCPS treated Beidleman as a rising star. Despite six staff members’ reports to MCPS about his conduct in 2023, officials promoted him in June to run Paint Branch High School in Burtonsville, a position that oversees a larger staff than Farquhar’s and would have raised his salary by $32,000, to $191,000.
...
After The Post submitted a list of questions last week, MCPS placed Beidleman on “extended leave,” said it wanted staff members who’d been mistreated to come forward and launched “an independent, external investigation about all matters brought to our attention by the Washington Post.”

Also from the Washington Post article, we see an example of the people who make life unsurvivable for people like me:  Miya Page.   She's another version of the white people MLK warned us about.  She must not be Biedleman's type.

"Farquhar history teacher Miya Page said that while she was aware of his bullying, she did not personally experience it. “He’s very focused on student achievement and making sure students feel safe, loved and appreciated,” she said. “Whenever I had a concern, I could go to him. He usually took my thoughts and ideas and implemented them. I felt heard with him. I personally had a great time working for him.”

Except for the girls he's interrogating about their slutty clothes, or calling whores.

Hey Miya, if you ever need help with anything, don't come to me for real.  Take your stab wounds or whatever and cry to your good buddy Joel.  Let him do your CPR. 

Every once in a while we get a bittersweet ending.  It's not really a happy ending, because whatever happened to Diana was horrible.  But by the grace of God she's back with her family now.

Screw the Long Beach Police for using the classic "magic eraser of police work" and classifying this as a runaway.

Also, there's a world of difference between "true crime" where people are making a sport of the hunt for Gabby Petito's killer, and actually caring about someone like Diana who is missing.  I don't know how to get people to actually care.  Because that's all it took.  Within a few hours of putting Diana's story on TV, someone recognized her and she was rescued.  Shame on the Long Beach Police.  Too busy taking homeless people away from storefronts.

From ABC7:

LONG BEACH, Calif. (KABC) -- A Long Beach teen who was missing for two months has been found, just hours after news reports about her disappearance.

A representative of the family told Eyewitness News Tuesday night that Diana Rojas was spotted in the South Los Angeles area by a person who recognized her from news reports earlier in the day. Police were notified and informed her parents that she was found.
Details about her condition and circumstances of her disappearance were not immediately available.

My big love-hate relationship with A&E includes my favorite show, Parking Wars.  Because Parking Wars is where America lets it all hang out.  That's who we are in real life.  We are a bag of dicks when somebody asks us nicely to move from where we're not supposed to be.

This story is just layer upon layer of sad.
Department of Justice:

"According to court records and evidence presented at trial, Jesse Fernando Perez, 36, is currently serving a 121-month federal sentence for possession of child pornography at the Federal Correctional Complex in Petersburg, Virginia. While incarcerated, he copied images of children from books and magazines, and then drew on the images to create depictions of the children engaged in sexually explicit activity.

Perez faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years and a maximum sentence of 60 years in prison when sentenced on December 11. Actual sentences for federal crimes are typically less than the maximum penalties. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after taking into account the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors."

So he's already in prison for child porn.  They probably shouldn't be letting him have books and magazines with pictures of children in them, because he's weird like that.  He's obviously in a bad enough place in his life where he's liable to do stuff like this.

I don't feel right prosecuting someone for being such a pitiful little sad man that he would do something like this so he can wank, frankly.  The boy aint right.  Part of me feels like people shouldn't spend another FIFTEEN YEARS in prison for drawing dirty pictures of kids because they're too messed up to do anything better with their time.  I mean it's a seriously messed-up cry for help.

That said, a 36-year-old man who, if he didn't have access to actual sexual pictures of children, would go to this length to gratify himself, has to be kept out of circulation.  There's a reason even facsimiles of child porn are criminalized, and I agree with that.  It's why you can be arrested for trying to meet up with a decoy 12-year-old.

I just wish America wasn't the incarceration nation, and we were actually helping people.  Why is there always so much sexual violence?  WTF?  Why is prison the answer to every problem?

On the one hand, as I just discussed with the Newburgh 4, I don't trust the FBI not to be all Wile E. Coyote, making up fake bomb plots to put people in prison for life so they can get gold stars at work,  They'll do that!

The FBI also played quite a role in letting Whitey Bulger run amok in Boston for years.  And I personally believe they had a lot to do with the person who killed the Jennings 8, and possibly whoever dumped the women out on the mesa in Albuquerque.  The West Mesa killer, I believe, has law enforcement connections.  And it wouldn't surprise me at all if they were at least friends with the FBI.

Anyway, not to be Debbie Downer, because here the FBI really done good.  They do a great job with the chomos.  NCMEC consistently does great work.

FBI.gov

"More than 200 victims of sex trafficking were rescued during a nationwide enforcement campaign last month that also included the identification or arrest of more than five dozen suspected human traffickers and 126 individuals accused of child sexual exploitation and trafficking offenses.

The FBI-led “Operation Cross Country,” which involved nearly every FBI field office and their respective state and local partners, also located 59 minor victims of child sex trafficking and sexual exploitation, and another 59 children who had been reported missing.   
The two-week law enforcement initiative—now in its 13th year—is a coordinated operation among the FBI, other federal agencies, state and local police, and social services agencies across the country to find and assist victims of human trafficking, particularly child victims. Law enforcement agencies conduct targeted operations to identify traffickers, their networks, and their victims. FBI victim specialists, working alongside local agencies, then provide immediate support and access to the extensive resources that are available to all federal crime victims. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) is a significant partner in the initiative. The private non-profit is a clearinghouse of information and has assisted in more than 400,000 cases of missing kids who were recovered since its founding in 1984."