Free Republic

As Congress remains in a protracted recess for another three weeks and the political news recedes from the headlines, it didn’t take long for the nonpolitical event surrounding the unrest in Ferguson, Missouri, to become political. After all, everything in this day and age is ultimately politicized.

If you want to understand everything that is wrong with the current crop of leaders in both parties, take a look at this story out of Nashville by local investigative reporter Ben Hall. Evidently, Lamar’s top campaign staffers were coordinating the creation of a traveling exhibit of Senator Alexander with the taxpayer-funded Tennessee State Museum. The exhibit, which would paint a acclamatory picture of the senior senator, was originally going to be deployed towards the end of this year and into 2014, to coincide with his reelection campaign…that is..until Ben Hall caught them in the act. The taxpayer-supported museum had...

Snip: The Ohio Republican has smoothed over differences with Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), expanded his powers on the panel that doles out plum committee assignments, shot down a challenge to his earmark moratorium and worked behind the scenes to ensure that Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) would win her leadership contest.

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”It’s the unconcquerable soul of man, not the nature of the weapons he uses, that insures victory.” General George S. Patton, Jr "Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way!"General Michael G.P. Savage

MARTINEZ - The only person to provide an alibi for Scott Dyleski testified Wednesday he is no longer certain he saw the teenager at all on the morning Pamela Vitale was killed. "My testimony wasn't entirely truthful," Fred Curiel said about his earlier testimony at a February preliminary hearing. Curiel and his wife own the home where Dyleski was living at the time of the Vitale slaying. Prosecutors say the 17-year-old Dyleski killed Vitale on Oct. 15, 2005, as part of a scheme to use credit card information and purchase marijuana growing equipment. He has pleaded not guilty to murder...

MARTINEZ -- Accused killer Scott Dyleski engaged in sado masochism, talked about beating and breaking the necks of children and was curious about how the human body would function without certain organs, his girlfriend testified Thursday. A visibly uncomfortable Jena Reddy, 18, told jurors in Contra Costa Superior Court that Dyleski didn't admit to killing his Lafayette neighbor Pamela Vitale in October but didn't deny it either. After Vitale was killed, Dyleski had scratches on his face and his right hand and arm were swollen, she said. She added, however, that she was the source of scratches on his back...

MARTINEZ -- Scott Dyleski and a teenage friend exchanged e-mails about how to avoid detection while using other people's credit cards to order marijuana-growing equipment online, a computer expert testified today in the youth's murder trial. "Do not order all at once. Use separate cards for each purchase. The larger the order, prob(ably) the more likely it is to be noticed," Robin Croen, 17, e-mailed Dyleski in September, a month before the defendant allegedly killed his Lafayette neighbor Pamela Vitale, according to the testimony of Phil Venable, a Contra Costa County sheriff's deputy acting as a district attorney's inspector. "We...

MARTINEZ - Daniel Horowitz was just inside his front door when, as he dropped his bags of groceries in shock, he saw his wife lying dead in the home they shared on a Lafayette hillside. "It was like a crime scene photograph," Horowitz testified Tuesday, shaking his head. "I knew it wasn't." The veteran defense attorney took the stand to testify for the prosecution in trial of Scott Dyleski, the teenager accused of killing his wife, Pamela Vitale. He described in vivid detail the blood he saw smudged on the door when he came home the evening of Oct. 15...

MARTINEZ - Pamela Vitale's husband Daniel Horowitz is expected to testify today in Superior Court in Martinez in the trial of the teenager accused of killing his wife. Monday marks the first day the jury will hear evidence in the murder case of 17-year-old Scott Dyleski charged with murder and burglary in the October 2005 killing. His attorney has said that he was at home at the time of Vitale's death.

As the high-profile murder trial of Scott Dyleski begins with opening statements today in a Martinez courtroom, a number of personalities will take center stage as the jury considers whether the teenager killed his Lafayette neighbor, Pamela Vitale. The trial will pit veteran Contra Costa County prosecutor Harold "Hal" Jewett, known as a formidable adversary in court, against Ellen Leonida, a lesser-known public defender with experience helping the homeless and refugees seeking asylum. Managing it all will be Superior Court Judge Barbara Zuniga, a former deputy probation officer and prosecutor with more than 20 years on the bench. After a...

Scott Dyleski's murder trial should be moved out of Contra Costa County because of a "media feeding frenzy" that has contaminated the jury pool, his attorney said in court documents made available Thursday. Deputy Public Defender Ellen Leonida cited newspaper articles and television reports that referred to the "alleged 'Goth' lifestyle of Scott Dyleski" and the possibility of "occult connections to the crime," specifically the description by some media that a "Gothic symbol" was carved onto the back of slaying victim Pamela Vitale. Vitale's husband, Daniel Horowitz, has been described as "well-known" and "prominent," drawing even more attention and further...

LAFAYETTE - The attorney representing murder suspect Scott Dyleski has asked a judge to consider whether evidence obtained by tracking dogs can be used at trial. The dogs were not reliable, deputy public defender Ellen Leonida argues in a motion submitted last week to a Contra Costa County Superior Court judge. Dyleski, 17, is charged with murder and burglary in the Oct. 15, 2005 killing of high-tech executive Pamela Vitale. Leonida raises instances she argues show that the dogs became interested in material unrelated to the case. On the day after the killing, a tracking dog focused on a bucket...

MARTINEZ, Calif. (Court TV) - In her second contentious day of cross-examination, murder defendant Susan Polk accused the prosecutor of using "doctored" autopsy photos of her husband's stab wounds and accused a former attorney of "setting up" a teenager in a murder case. "I wonder if that photo has been manipulated by a computer program," Polk said when Assistant District Attorney Paul Sequeira showed jurors graphic pictures of the gashes to the inside of Felix Polk's hands. "I've cut my fingers a number of times in the kitchen, and it just doesn't look like that," Polk said. "Right," Sequeira said....

MARTINEZ -- A group of people who lived with Scott Dyleski filed a claim today against Contra Costa County, claiming sheriff's deputies traumatized them as authorities arrested the teen following the killing of television commentator Daniel Horowitz's wife. The residents, including two couples and their five children, who lived with Dyleski in the Lafayette home also filed a complaint today with the sheriff's office, saying deputies threatened them at gunpoint during the Oct. 19 raid, used profanity and violated their rights. Sheriff's deputies fanned through the house and, as they encountered occupants, ordered them to "get the f -- down"...

As Susan Polk, who is defending herself against charges that she murdered her husband, cross-examined her son last week, it was clear she forgot the courtroom rule "Don't ask a question unless you already know the answer." By doing so, Polk set herself up for a damaging blow by her son Gabriel Polk, who is convinced his mother is guilty. "Isn't it true that you were not the big guy that you are now?" she asked, in what she probably thought was a mundane question about a schoolyard fight from years ago. Gabriel Polk looked at his mother and replied,...

Judge says sufficient evidence provided in preliminary hearing. Scott Dyleski will stand trial for murder in the slaying of television commentator Daniel Horowitz's wife, a case that has drawn national attention since the prominent lawyer, while himself involved in a high-profile murder trial, found her body at their home in Lafayette in October. After four days of testimony, Contra Costa Superior Court Judge Mary Ann O'Malley ruled Friday that prosecutor Harold Jewett had presented ample evidence that Dyleski, 17, probably killed his neighbor Pamela Vitale, 52, on Oct. 15. Dyleski showed no emotion as O'Malley made her ruling in a...

MARTINEZ -- An Orinda woman accused of killing her husband three years ago can represent herself at trial, a judge ruled today after removing her high-profile attorney from the case because of a conflict of interest. Susan Polk, who had told Superior Court Judge Laurel Brady last week that she wanted to dump Daniel Horowitz, can indeed defend herself on charges that she killed her husband, Berkeley psychotherapist Felix Polk, the judge said. But it was unclear after today's hearing in Martinez whether Polk, 48, will be ready for a trial scheduled to begin Jan. 31. She is charged with...

Defense attorney Daniel Horowitz said Wednesday that his client, Susan Polk, no longer wants his services and prefers to represent herself when she goes on trial this month on charges she killed her husband in their Orinda home. "It doesn't matter why she wants to represent herself," Horowitz said. "She doesn't have to have a reason." Polk and her defense team are scheduled to meet with Contra Costa Superior Court Judge Laurel Brady on Friday, about three weeks before Polk's second trial is set to begin, Horowitz said. Polk will argue that she is competent and ready to represent herself....

Oct. 27 - ABC7 has confirmed that the mother of the prime suspect in the murder of a prominent East Bay Attorney's wife, is also under arrest. Scott Dyleski's mother, Esther Fielding, was arrested this afternoon as an accessory to murder after the fact. She is being held at county jail in Martinez on $500,000 dollars bail. Stay with abc7news.com for more information on this developing story as it becomes available. Scott Dyleski Appears In Court The 16-year-old accused of killing the wife of a prominent defense attorney and television commentator went to his girlfriend's house to have sex in...