Free Republic

NEW YORK (AP) - Jailed Mafia boss Joseph Massino secretly recorded his successor plotting the assassination of a federal prosecutor, becoming the first head of a New York Mafia family known to have turned government informant, sources familiar with the case said Thursday. A federal indictment unsealed Thursday alleges that acting Bonanno family head Vincent "Vinny Gorgeous" Basciano planned the killing of a top mob prosecutor in meetings with someone described as a "high-ranking member" of his crime family. The FBI recorded the conversations with the help of the high-ranking member, the indictment says. Several sources familiar with the investigation...

GRACANICA, Serbia and Montenegro (Reuters) - A Serb teenager has been shot dead in Kosovo and police quickly arrested two Albanians suspected of trying to ignite another round of ethnic violence in the United Nations-run province. The killing in the Serb enclave of Gracanica on Saturday was the first since 19 people were killed in mid-March when the U.N. protectorate was engulfed in the worst violence in five years of international administration. NATO peacekeepers later said the riots were clearly orchestrated. U.N. police spokesman Malcolm Ashby said 16-year-old Dimitrije Popovic was killed when gunmen fired from a car into a...

<p>SACRAMENTO – The new chief of the nation's largest prison system says it will take years and wholesale ethics retraining to end a corrosive "code of silence" that she has experienced within the California Department of Corrections.</p> <p>Director Jeanne S. Woodford blamed the prison system's chronic overspending on unrealistic underfunding by the previous administration as costs soared to meet federal and state laws and the requirements of running an around-the-clock operation.</p>

<p>Responding to criticism that the state's prison system is beset with corruption and mismanagement, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Monday he'll appoint a special commission to investigate the problems.</p> <p>Although aides said Schwarzenegger announced the move earlier than expected and that details won't be available for several weeks, he said in a talk radio interview that his commission would "really study the whole prison system Â… the overspending that has occurred, why is this kind of corruption going on.</p>