Free Republic

A state board on Thursday granted 14 rape victims who had been working as prostitutes the right to be compensated, the first such action since it reversed its policy on the issue last year. The California Victim Compensation and Government Claims Board took the action on behalf of women whose claims had previously been denied. The victims' next step is to submit the amount of compensation they are seeking.

Sometime in the future, technicians will go over the scene of the crime. They’ll uncover some DNA evidence and take it to the lab. And when the cops need to get a picture of the suspect, they won’t have to ask eyewitnesses to give descriptions to a sketch artist – they’ll just ask the technicians to get a mugshot from the DNA. That, at least, is the potential of new research being published today in PLOS Genetics. In that paper, a team of scientists describe how they were able to produce crude 3D models of faces extrapolated from a person’s...

A MURDER has been committed, and all the cops have to go on is a trace of DNA left at the scene. It doesn't match any profile in databases of known criminals, and the trail goes cold. But what if the police could issue a wanted poster based on a realistic "photofit" likeness built from that DNA? Not if, but when, claim researchers who have developed a method for determining how our genes influence facial shape. One day, the technique may even allow us to gaze into the faces of extinct human-like species that interbred with our own ancestors. It's...

Glenn Reynolds not only runs the indispensable Instapundit website, he is also a distinguished law professor at the University of Tennessee and writes a regular column for USA Today. Today’s column is an important one, “Our Criminal Justice System Has Become a Crime.”

A "goon-squad" group named The Helpful Union Guys (THUG), members of Ironworkers Local 401 set fires, started riots, and took crowbars to the competition in an effort to protect union jobs. THUGs stalked women, took baseball bats to a Toys R Us site, and even torched a Quaker meetinghouse that dared to use non-union labor. Philly.Com reports 10 leaders of Ironworkers Local 401 charged in racketeering indictment. They called themselves "the Helpful Union Guys" - "THUGS" for short - and woe awaited any contractor who dared cross them by hiring non-organized workers. For, federal authorities alleged Tuesday, this "goon squad"...

One of the hallmarks of a totalitarian state is that there are so many laws and regulations that no one can possibly know what they are, let alone obey them. Thus everyone is a criminal, and only the despot’s discretion separates the solid citizen from the criminal. Unfortunately, the United States is rapidly approaching–if it has not already reached–this dystopian status. So Glenn Reynolds’s great column in USA Today should be a starting point for lots of conversations. Glenn offers several suggestions for how this situation might be remedied, which, again, are a starting point for discussion. But the real...

A drug ring that employed a vast network — including a voodoo priest — supplying methamphetamine across Central Florida and the U.S. was shutdown this week, the Polk County Sheriff's office announced Wednesday. The 13 suspects arrested Tuesday were among 25 couriers, distributors and street dealers identified in Operation Hoodoo Voodoo, the investigation of a multimillion-dollar meth pipeline from Mexico. Javier Flores, known as "El Don (The Boss)," supervised the shipments from his home in southern California and remains at large, according to Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd. On Tuesday, 44 pounds of the powerful amphetamine were seized at Love's...

With two weeks left to sign up for coverage, California's health insurance exchange announced Monday it has surged past a major milestone -- 1 million enrollments -- well ahead of its March 31 goal. And a new report suggests what may be the biggest motivator for people when they are choosing a new health plan: cost. Insurers like Blue Shield of California and Health Net have seen a major jump in market share, thanks to their competitively low rates, according to a report Monday from the Kaiser Family Foundation, while Anthem Blue Cross' dominance has softened. The shifting landscape indicates...

The National Guard reservist charged on Monday with attempting to blow up the Los Angeles subway allegedly possessed terrorist manuals on how to be a “lone wolf” terrorist and was a frequent reader of al Qaeda’s Inspire magazine, which provides tips on how to make and detonate various bombs, according to FBI court documents. The FBI charged Nicholas Teausant, a 20-year-old National Guard reservist, with attempting to help al Qaeda carry out a plot to attack the subway system in Los Angeles. Teausant was a frequent Internet contributor to forums for would-be terrorists and is said to have owned a...

A Church Hill woman is facing charges after police say she crashed her car into a church and then stabbed her husband. Police tell us the suspect, 23-year-old Stephanie Hamman, says she drove through the church after 'God told her to.' The front of Providence Church in Church Hill, Tennessee is destroyed after police say Hamman drove through the building. Click here to view photos from the scene. Officers say she told them, "God told me he wanted me in there, so I drove my car through the front doors." "The damage had pretty much taken out our door. It's...

The man pleaded guilty to a smuggling charge ThursdayA man has admitted to smuggling thousands of dollars’ worth of dried sea cucumbers into the U.S. from Mexico, according to federal officials. On Thursday, Cheng Zhuo Liu, 50, of Chula Vista, Calif. appeared in federal court in San Diego. Liu pleaded guilty to smuggling 100 pounds of the endangered species on Oct. 3, 2013 by hiding them in his Hyundai’s spare tire area, according to U.S. Attorney Laura Duffy. That amount of sea cucumbers has a market value of between $5,000 and $10,000. The marine animals are protected under the Convention...

(Reuters) - Russian state media said Crimeans voted overwhelmingly to break with Ukraine and join Russia on Sunday, as Kiev accused Moscow of pouring forces into the peninsula and warned separatist leaders "the ground will burn under their feet". RIA news agency said 93 percent backed annexation, citing an exit poll released as voting ended at 8 p.m. (1800 GMT). Another Russian agency said turnout was over 80 percent. Caught in an East-West crisis reminiscent of the Cold War, Kiev said Russia's build-up of forces in the Black Sea region was in "crude violation" of an international treaty, and announced...

I posted this as Putin's Kiss yesterday, and it only got one hit. Maybe if I post its title as a movie on Netflix that might stir more interest, because like the Lives of Others, this movie/documentary is well worth watching. The parallels between Russian society and ours is not only instructive but frightening, and I wish our leftist youth could see themselves as Masha in Putin's Kiss. Want to see what America will become before the end of the Obama regime? Want to see where it is happening right now, and from which we are just days away? Want...

<p>A Smyrna woman has been charged with murder after police say she admitted lacing her husband's steroid injections with antifreeze.</p> <p>State police say 44-year-old Jamie Baker was arrested on Thursday and charged with first-degree murder in the death of her husband, 42-year-old James Baker.</p>

The executive director of Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers is facing up to two weeks in jail on a contempt of court charge for stuffing an anonymous tip in his mouth instead of handing it over to a judge Friday.

Dwindling defense budgets have been a boon to drug trafficking networks in Latin America as U.S. intelligence and interdiction assets in the Caribbean have been pared down, the top American commander responsible for the region said Thursday. “Because of asset shortfalls, we’re unable to get after 74 percent of suspected maritime drug smuggling,” Marine Gen. John F. Kelly told the Senate Armed Services Committee during a hearing about threats and military posture in the Western Hemisphere. “I simply sit and watch it go by.” Kelly said that, because of tightening defense budgets, he does not anticipate getting additional assets for...

"I was in shock. I was outraged and I just assumed kits were being tested," said actress Mariska Hargitay about the thousands of rape kits in Detroit and across the country that have been left sitting in storage without being processed, allowing rapists to remain free to attack again. And they often do. Hargitay joined Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy to announce legislation that will soon be introduced to state lawmakers that is aimed at setting guidelines and deadlines for rape kits tests to be processed. "Testing rape kits is vital for keeping rapists off the street," said Hargitay during...

Jordan Wiser — an 18-year-old U.S. Army enlistee, EMT trainee, and personal safety expert — is exactly the kind of person who should carry a pocketknife. Even so, he was expelled from his technical school — where he was training to be a police officer — put in jail, charged with a felony and discharged from the Army Future Soldiers program. His dream to be a soldier, police officer or firefighter is likely dead. Why? Because he kept a pocketknife in his car so that he could assist at accident sites, consistent with his EMT training. Wiser shared his story...

<p>Authorities said the two girls, ages 17 and 15, admitted to police that they assaulted the boy, 16, with a knife on "multiple occasions." "His parents refer to him as (having) been diagnosed autistic," said Sgt. Cara Grumbles, a spokeswoman for the sheriff's office. "Some of the sexual acts involved animals. It's awful."</p>

Is identity theft a real enough problem to warrant $10/month monitoring service? I must decide whether or not to get the service but to initiate it I must trust the service with a lot of personal data.