Free Republic

TRAVERSE CITY — Alyce Morales' sobs hung in a Benzie County courtroom as she told a judge that panic gripped her after she secretly gave birth to a daughter in a tent. Morales, 19, of Cicero, Illinois, said she felt sorry every day since July 22, 2013, for what happened next. She closed her fist and struck herself before hitting her daughter, Marie, with a blow that fractured the infant's skull. "I was in a really bad situation. I was alone and scared. I didn't think anything was going to happen, so I panicked," she said Tuesday. "I know that's...

Albany Officials at one of the state's largest public labor unions shielded a downstate council leader from potential prosecution after she allegedly used a union debit card to make at least $20,000 in questionable purchases — including liquor, restaurant bills and home improvement items. Several people familiar with the matter, and internal documents filed with the Albany-based Public Employees Federation, indicate PEF's leaders asked to handle the matter as an internal "ethics violation" when contacted several months ago by the office of Rockland County District Attorney Thomas P. Zugibe. The union represents more than 53,000 state government workers. The district...

An ex-cruise ship worker admitted to a federal judge Monday that he brutally beat, raped and tried to throw a passenger overboard because he believed she insulted his mother. With no plea bargain offered, Ketut Pujayasa, 29, in a Miami federal courtroom changed his plea to guilty on charges of attempted murder and aggravated sexual assault.

Self-described 'dissident feminist' Camille Paglia has written an op-ed piece for Time Magazine arguing that female college students are naive and careless about the true nature of men as sexual predators. Paglia, 67, a professor at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, penned the column this week in reaction to the recent abduction of University of Virginia sophomore Hannah Graham, 18, who was last seen two weeks ago in the company of a 32-year-old nursing assistant. Jesse Matthew was captured in Texas last week and charged with abduction with intent to defile, but so far there is no sign...

Michigan Supreme Court Justice Stephen Markman wants state lawmakers to clarify statutes that criminalize administrative offenses. Offenders are often surprised when they are charged with a “strict liability public welfare offense” because it is not obvious the act is a crime. Michigan has a number of such statutes on the books, such as driving a snowmobile that is too loud or modifying private property that a regulator may view as a protected wetland. The acts are often misdemeanors punishable by a fine, but if convicted the offenders have a criminal record, impeding their ability to find a job or get...

The party in the new club continued into the wee hours Sunday morning. Strawberry daiquiris flowed. Music from DJ Bay Bay pulsed. Teens were chilling and dancing. Then came the gunfire. Witnesses said they heard dozens of rounds, maybe 100, rip through a storefront Miami nightclub called The Spot, wedged between a furniture store and a smoke shop. When the gunfire stopped, 15 young people were wounded, bloodied and dazed, the youngest of them 11 years old, the oldest 25. “Young people now, throughout the United States — Chicago or Miami or LA or wherever you’re at, even in small...

There were no demonstrators outside the Ferguson Police Department or on the city's main business center Sunday afternoon, yet the wounding overnight of two police officers in apparently unrelated incidents left the troubled Missouri city far from at ease.. Tensions flared in the St. Louis suburb over the weekend after officials said a Ferguson police officer was shot in the arm Saturday while chasing a suspect outside the city's community center. In a separate shooting incident shortly after midnight early Sunday morning, an off-duty St. Louis city officer was hurt by breaking glass after the occupants of another vehicle shot...

EARLIER this month, my iPhone vanished. I looked up its location on an app called Find My Friends that my wife and I use, and I had a shock: The app said my phone was in a house 15 miles away, in a neighborhood that I’d never visited. I drove there. It was night. The house looked creepy. My wife stayed in the car, cellphone in hand, ready to summon the cavalry. I walked to the front door and rang the doorbell. Nothing. The lights were on, so I rang again and knocked hard. I spent five minutes ringing the...

Georgia authorities went to a great deal of trouble to nab a woman who filed a state income tax return for a whopping $94 million. State revenue agents actually cut a check for $94,323,148 and told Brigitte Jackson to come on down to a Cobb County bank inside a supermarket to cash it. And when she arrived and tried to redeem the bogus document, the handcuffs came out, reported WSB-TV.

Chilling images have been captured of a woman hiding on her roof, cowering with fear, unable to see a masked intruder approaching her from behind. The Californian woman climbed out of her second-storey bedroom window early in the morning on Wednesday to hide from a man who broke into her home in Venice Beach, near Los Angeles. "Once I saw him in the house, I knew that we both couldn't be there," Melora Rivera told CBS news. "I knew that I didn't want to have a confrontation with him of any sort, you know, not knowing what his intention was."...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK) On Friday, Oklahoma City’s KFOR reported that the FBI is investigating claims that Alton Nolen, a man who beheaded one of his former co-workers before stabbing another had tried to convert others to Islam. According to KFOR, “the FBI is now looking into Nolen’s background after his former co-workers said he tried to convert them to Islam after recently converting himself.” The investigation is ongoing, and according to KFOR “it is not known if the suspect’s beliefs played a role in the attack.” The station said that police are saying Nolen randomly attacked two employees in the front office...

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — An unarmed man shot by a South Carolina trooper during a traffic stop repeated one question through his anguished cries as he lay wounded, waiting for an ambulance: "Why did you shoot me?" Levar Jones' painful groans and then-Trooper Sean Groubert's reply — "Well you dove head first back into your car" — were captured by a dashboard camera in the trooper's car. Groubert had stopped Jones on a seatbelt violation at a Columbia gas station and fired the shots moments after asking Jones for his license

A private investigator working on what’s become a botched murder case sought evidence North Las Vegas police didn’t: video from the suspect’s alibi. That suspect was Patrick Wayne Harper, the 16-year-old cleared in the killing of Andrea Lafon. Police said she died during a marijuana deal gone bad. Investigator Toby Tobiasson, working for lawyer Kristina Wildeveld, got a court order for surveillance video from the convenience store Harper said he was at when Lafon was shot about 7:15 p.m. Sept. 5. The video shows Harper leaving the AMPM at 5th Street and Washburn Road — more than two miles from...

When Steven Jones is sitting in prison (and I’m pretty sure the despicable abuse of his judicial powers will persuade a federal judge he’s unworthy of probation), don’t feel too sorry for him. He probably won’t have money woes when he gets out. While he’s pumping iron behind bars, he can rest assured he might be able to get up to 75 percent of his $200,000 a year salary as a judicial pension, at least at some point. That’s the way the system works. A pension is an earned benefit, so you can be a teacher convicted of molesting children...

PETA wants accused cannibal killer fed vegan diet JEFFERSONVILLE, Ind. – It has the stuff of a comedic one-liner, but PETA says it is dead serious in urging the local sheriff to feed an accused cannibal killer a vegan diet in order to “swear off flesh” while he’s imprisoned. Kenneth Montville, a national spokesman for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, said the proposal is aimed at making the group’s point that meatless food can help reduce violent behavior and also save money for jails. “We really want to take a situation that’s a tragedy and make it into...

A man charged in the disappearance of a University of Virginia student was captured in Texas on Wednesday, a day after police announced they had probable cause to arrest him.

Following the arrest on Wednesday of Jesse Leroy Matthew Jr., some community leaders are asking if the pursuit of justice for Hannah Graham came at the expense of eroded trust among Central Virginia’s black residents. Authorities last week identified Matthew, 32, as a person of interest in the case. Graham, an 18-year-old University of Virginia student, disappeared on Sept. 13. Authorities on Tuesday charged Matthew with abduction with intent to defile and on Wednesday night they announced Matthew had been apprehended in Galveston, Texas, some 1,300 miles from Charlottesville. After Matthew was identified, men who happened to resemble Matthew, who...

Dr. Jim Garrow is the Christian founder and executive director of The Bethune Institute, a charitable organization dedicated to advance education in China via teaching English, giving free books to poor Chinese, and medical scholarships. Through its branch organization, The Pink Pagoda, the institute also rescues baby girls from infanticide in China, and finds homes for the unwanted girls. Dr. Garrow is credited for saving the lives of over 50,000 Chinese girls for which he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Last year, Garrow told the world (via Alex Jones’ radio, Glenn Beck, and other conservative media) that Obama’s...

A pair of gunmen attack the six diners as they leave the St Louis restaurant One man holding a small silver gun shouts 'This is for Michael Brown' The two attackers, both described as black and in their 20s, fled the scene The victims aged 59 to 61 had just left Eleven Eleven restaurant at 11pmTwo armed raiders held up three couples leaving a St Louis restaurant shouting: 'This is for Michael Brown,' before running off with their belongings. One of the men was holding a silver gun as the diners, aged between 59 and 61 left the Eleven Eleven...

Family wants Justice for Eric YUCAIPA, CA - The man who killed Eric Haydu, 22 never spent one (1) day in jail. Illegal alien, Pablo Duaarte Rodreiguez, who had multiple citations for driving without a license now wants the judge to terminate his probation, and release him from the "unsupervised probation;" for kiling Eric. Read Rodriguez made an illegal left turn in front of Eric on August 11, 2012, who was on his motorcycle along with his passenger. Eric never regained consciousness and died on September 8, 2011. For taking Eric's life, Rodriguez was given a mere three (3) years...