Skip to content

Kit O'Connell: Approximately 8,000 Words Posts

Law Enforcement Lobby Succeeds In Killing California Transparency Bill

Posted in Journalism, and MintPress News

A California Senate committee killed a bill to increase transparency in police misconduct investigations, hampering victims’ efforts to obtain justice.

Chauncee Smith, legislative advocate at the ACLU of California, told MintPress News that the state Legislature “caved to the tremendous influence and power of the law enforcement lobby” and “failed to listen to the demands and concerns of everyday Californian people.”

California has some of the most secretive rules in the country when it comes to investigations into police misconduct and excessive use of force. Records are kept sealed, regardless of the outcome, as the ACLU of Northern California explains on its website:

‘A Fig Leaf For The Occupation’: Israeli Human Rights Group Ends Cooperation With Israeli Military

Posted in Journalism, and MintPress News

An Israeli NGO that protects the human rights of Palestinians announced last month that it would cease cooperating with the Israeli military in investigating soldiers’ crimes.

Founded in 1989, B’Tselem is dedicated to “promoting a future where all Israelis and Palestinians will live in freedom and dignity.”

One of the group’s major activities is exposing murders and other war crimes by members of the Israeli military assigned to enforce the country’s apartheid policies against the indigenous Palestinian population, including restrictions on freedom of movement. After collecting evidence of crimes against Palestinians, often through hidden cameras and other surveillance technologies, the group seeks legal justice for the victims.

“Ever since B’Tselem was established more than 25 years ago, it has applied to the Military Advocate General Corps (MAG Corps) regarding hundreds of incidents in which Palestinians were harmed by soldiers, demanding the incidents be investigated,” wrote B’Tselem in “The Occupation’s Fig Leaf: Israel’s Military Law Enforcement System as a Whitewash Mechanism,” a report issued May 25.

North Carolina Cuts Use Of Prison Torture In Half

Posted in Journalism, and MintPress News

Half as many prisoners in North Carolina face solitary confinement, thanks to dedicated efforts to cut back on the controversial practice often equated with torture.

“Last spring, roughly 5,330 of the state’s 38,000 prisoners – 1 in 7 – were segregated from other inmates on any given day,” wrote Taylor Knopf on May 26 in the News & Observer. “By this month, that number had been reduced to 2,540.”

Contrary to the idea that solitary confinement helps control dangerous inmates, Knopf noted: “State prison officials say solitary confinement is not working and doesn’t lead to positive behavioral change.”

“We are changing the culture” in prisons, said David Guice, the state’s prison commissioner, in an interview with Knopf. Other states saw reductions in violence against guards after limiting “heavy” use of solitary confinement, Guice said, expressing his hope that North Carolina would see similar results.

Aquatic ‘First Responders’ Form Mosquito Fleet To Halt Climate Change & Shell Oil

Posted in Journalism, and MintPress News

After years of marches and land-based blockades, environmental activists are now taking to the seas to stop the growth of the fossil fuel industry and protest the environmental threats facing them.

Inspired by actions last year against Shell Oil Co.’s plans to drill in the Arctic Circle, which included a kayak-based blockade, activists in the Pacific Northwest are forming a new “Mosquito Fleet” — a swarm of tiny boats that they hope will have a big impact by acting together.

Lois Canright, a fleet member who recently completed her first action, told MintPress News, “To me, the most important thing that I can do for me and everyone on this planet is to try and lower emissions down and to try to throw some wrenches into the fossil fuel infrastructure, especially because they’re trying to expand it in our region.”

The fleet took to the waters earlier this month, joining an effort by Break Free PNW to halt traffic from major fossil fuel export terminals operated by Shell Oil and Tesoro, another fossil fuel giant, at March Point in Anacortes, Washington, on the Puget Sound in the Salish Sea.

Remember The ‘Used & Betrayed’ Veterans Subjected To Horrific Experimentation

Posted in Journalism, and MintPress News

Every Memorial Day, American leaders make passionate speeches about their love and admiration for the sacrifices made by the country’s brave military veterans.

“There’s no phrase U.S. politicians love more than ‘support the troops,’” journalist Abby Martin declared on a recent episode of her show, “The Empire Files.”

Yet, as Martin noted, “A dark hidden history shows that [politicians are] no friend to service members, but rather their greatest enemy. An easy way to prove this is to look at how quickly they abandon their soldiers after ruining their lives, even after using them as literal lab rats.”

‘Chilling Attack On Free Speech’: Multinational Corporation Sues Gov’t Transparency Watchdog MuckRock

Posted in Journalism, and MintPress News

A popular website dedicated to government transparency is facing legal threats from a multinational corporation that hopes to block publication of documents related to their electricity meters.

MuckRock helps researchers, journalists, and normal citizens obtain government documents through Freedom of Information Act requests, or their local equivalent under state laws, then publicly shares the results. Earlier this month, the site surpassed one million documents shared.

In April, Phil Mocek, a Seattle-based software engineer, used the site to file an open records request with Seattle City Light, the local power company, seeking information relating to the security of smart power meters the city purchased from Landis+Gyr, a multinational owned by Toshiba.

On Wednesday, Landis+Gyr notified MuckRock that the company was suing in the Superior Court of Washington for King County to block the release of the records.