Free Republic

Wichita Police Chief Norman Williams met with more than 100 members of the city's Hispanic community Saturday to try to clear up misconceptions about how his officers deal with minorities. A major concern was a fear that any illegal immigrant in Wichita would be immediately arrested if he or she has any contact with Wichita police. "When a citizen is the victim of a crime, we do not ask if they are documented or undocumented," Williams said. The meeting at Horace Mann Dual Language Magnet School was arranged by Hispanos Unidos, a branch of Sunflower Community Action. Organization president Lore...

BAGHDAD (Army News Service, Nov. 17, 2005) -- Alert Iraqi neighborhood watch members in east Baghdad stopped a potential car bomb attack Nov. 15. Shortly before 6 p.m., local residents noticed a suspicious vehicle getting fuel from a roadside gasoline dealer. When the neighborhood watch members approached the driver, he pulled a pistol and pointed it at them and then attempted to flee. “The citizens tried to stop the suspect but were unsuccessful,” said Oday Fakhan, the leader of the neighborhood watch in the area. As he fled, the would-be car bomber attempted to highjack a get-away vehicle at gunpoint,...

Yesterday my wife and I attended a community awareness meeting called at our church to talk about the growing methamphetamine and illegal drug problem in our little Idaho community. The County Attorney and a Captain with the Idaho State Troopers made the presentation, with the local Police Chief and Sheriff also in attendance. About 300 people attended. Idaho is an increasing target for the Mexico Drug Cartels for developing and deciminating drugs. The officials clearly showed and demonstrated how these drugs are being funneled, using illegal aliens as carriers, from Mexico, across the remote sections of the US border and...

NEW ORLEANS -- The Algiers Point militia put away its weapons Friday as Army soldiers patrolled the historic neighborhood across the Mississippi River from the French Quarter. But the band of neighbors who survived Hurricane Katrina and then fought off looters has not disarmed. "Pit Bull Will Attack. We Are Here and Have Gun and Will Shoot," said the sign on Alexandra Boza's front porch. Actually, said the woman behind the sign, "I have two pistols." "I'm a part of the militia," Boza said. "We were taking the law into our own hands, but I didn't kill anyone." She did...

The nation's top immigration enforcement official on Wednesday praised the work of citizen patrols along the U.S-Mexican border and said his agency is looking at creating a volunteer reserve program to help beef up security. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Robert C. Bonner said his initial concerns about possible vigilantism by citizen patrol groups have been eased by the volunteers' conduct. "We welcome the eyes and ears of citizens who help us gain control of our borders, especially when they do so in a peaceful way," Bonner said during a visit to the Port of Los Angeles. "I applaud the...

The civilian-led border watch group known as the Minuteman Project plans to expand its membership into Canada, MSNBC.com has learned. The American-Canadian Conservative Coalition (AC3) has agreed to recruit and field Canadian volunteers who will join with the U.S.-based Minutemen to hold simultaneous cross-border vigils along the Michigan-Ontario border sometime this summer. The joint project will be called “Michigan-Ontario Minuteman Border Neighborhood Watch, according to a Minuteman Project spokesperson. The Minuteman Project came to prominence in April when the group fielded about 900 volunteers to patrol a 23-mile stretch of the Arizona-Mexico border. Earlier this week Chris Simcox, founder of...

HARRISBURG -- Way back in 1872, a deputy sheriff from Philadelphia traveled all the way to the northwest corner of Pennsylvania to bring back a suspect. But instead, the suspect killed the sheriff, and the killer was then captured and hanged by a private group of "volunteers" who called themselves the State Police of Crawford and Erie Counties. The vigilantes then carried the bodies of both dead men back to Philadelphia. "The group was also created to round up horse thieves," apparently a serious problem at the time, Col. Jeffrey Miller, commander of the Pennsylvania State Police, told a state...

Sunday, December 28, 2003 My Neighbor's Keeper: Residents fight to take back the streets By MICHAEL L. OWENS News Virginian Staff Writer He never much cared for the beer cans strewn on his lawn. And Ron McCutcheon cared even less for the strangers who guzzled the beer on his front porch while he was at work. He moved to North Charlotte Avenue from Charlottesville last year and, as a newcomer to Waynesboro, never anticipated home improvement would include a battle for the neighborhood. Drugs, junked cars and speeding motorists were just a few of the conversation topics he shared with...

Contact: Barb Chamberlain, WSU Spokane/WSU News Bureau, 509/358-7527, 509/869-2949 (cell), chamberlain@wsu.edu Mike Erp, director, Washington State Institute for Community Oriented Policing, 509/358-7951, erpmj@wsu.edu Community Policing Institute Visits Russian Community SPOKANE, Wash. -- A community policing institute founded at Washington State University Spokane and that served first as a model for the United States may inspire Russia as well. A delegation from the Western Regional Institute for Community Oriented Public Safety at WSU Spokane recently returned from Russia, where they participated in an exchange to pave the way for community-oriented policing. WRICOPS is one of 22 congressionally funded regional community policing...