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November 21, 2019 CWBChicago Citywide Two years into an “affordable bail” initiative that is allowing most accused gun offenders and even accused murderers to be released from jail to await trial, Cook County’s chief judge says the program is working fabulously. “It’s not by magic that we haven’t had any horrible incidents occur using this new [bail] system,” Chief Judge Timothy Evans said during county budget hearings on Nov. 4. There are likely many people who would disagree with Evans’ definition of “horrible incidents” — if they were still alive to do so. • On Feb. 9, Daryl Williams violated...

A Queens man caught preparing for a 9/11 anniversary suicide bomb attack on the subways under Grand Central will soon walk out of prison thanks to a sentence that amounts to his time already served, a judge ruled Thursday. Najibullah Zazi, 33, had faced up to life in prison after his 2009 arrest, but spent nearly the next 10 years cooperating against al Qaeda. Thursday’s 10-year sentence - which, given his good behavior behind bars, means he will be sprung any day now - came at the urging of prosecutors, who cited his extensive cooperation in arguing that he deserved...

Kim Endicott and her local driver were abducted last Tuesday in a wild park. Following their kidnapping, a ransom had been demanded for their release. On Sunday, the pair were reported to have been released and returned to Ishasha Wilderness Camp, an area owned by the Wild Frontiers Camp. A ransom was believed to have been paid for their release.

President Donald Trump said Wednesday that three American prisoners released from North Korea were headed home.

Only in Turkey is the identity of a citizen a matter of national security. That’s why the population registry in Ankara was until now a closed book, its details a state secret. Mustafa Kemal Ataturk’s definition of “Turkishness” was “anyone who is attached to the Turkish state as a citizen”. Turks came from a clear ethnic identity, untainted by racial minorities or doubtful lineage. That’s one reason why the Nazis lavished praise on Ataturk’s republic, their newspapers mourning his death in black-bordered front pages. After all, as Hitler was to ask in several newspaper interviews – and to his generals...

PRAGUE (Reuters) - A Czech court ruled on Tuesday that former Syrian Kurdish PYD leader Saleh Muslim be released, despite Turkey’s call for his detention pending an extradition request. snip “The court ruled Mr. Muslim will be released,” a spokeswoman for the Prague Municipal Court, Marketa Puci, said, adding the ruling had taken legal effect as both the state attorney and the defense gave up their rights to appeal. “The court accepted a promise by Mr. Muslim that he will remain on EU territory and will be attending court hearings.”

ISTANBUL/ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey said on Friday the case of two journalists held for more than a year over alleged ties to a failed coup would be decided by a local court, after the Constitutional Court ruled they be freed, a turnaround likely to deepen concerns for press freedom. snip Earlier on Friday Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdag said the top court had overstepped its limit. “When ruling on individual applications, the Constitutional Court... cannot act like a super appeals court and cannot make rulings like such courts,” Bozdag wrote on Twitter.

Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, and the leading minority member of the 2016 Gang of Eight (intelligence oversight) when she previously held Vice-Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, released the full transcript of the Judiciary Committee interview with Fusion-GPS founder Glenn Simpson. The transcript was released over the objections of Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley who is investigating the role of Fusion-GPS and their “Steele Dossier” in the 2016 DOJ/FBI surveillance operation of presidential candidate Donald Trump.

The National Archives is releasing documents previously withheld in accordance with the JFK Assassination Records Collection Act. The vast majority of the Collection (88%) has been open in full and released to the public since the late 1990s. The records at issue are documents previously identified as assassination records, but withheld in full or withheld in part. Learn more These releases include FBI, CIA, and other agency documents (both formerly withheld in part and formerly withheld in full) identified by the Assassination Records Review Board as assassination records. The releases to date are as follows: July 24, 2017: 3,810 documents...

'Nothing has been done or will be done to disabuse them of their sentiment' News from a Congressional Research Service report that 50 “homegrown violent jihadists” are scheduled to be released in the United States between last January and the end of 2026 raises the obvious question of whether Americans have something to fear. Among the incarcerated, according to the Bureau of Prisons, are 380 linked to international terrorism and 83 tied to domestic terrorism. Unfortunately, more attention has been paid to incarcerating the jihadists than to what happens when they complete their sentences, the Associated Press noted in a...

Full title: In Freeing Illegal Alien Gang Member Obama Judge Says U.S. Violated Rights of Due Process, Family Unity An Obama-appointed federal judge in Virginia ordered an illegal immigrant member of a violent street gang released from prison because immigration authorities supposedly violated his rights when he entered the U.S. illegally through Mexico. The Honduran teen crossed the Rio Grande during the influx of illegal alien minors a few years ago and turned himself into the U.S Border Patrol, according to a lengthy mainstream newspaper article , after acknowledging his gang history. The feds held him without a hearing in...

HDP Şırnak parliamentarian Ferhat Encü, who had been arrested during the political genocide operations and held hostage for 104 days before his release on Wednesday, was re-arrested after the prosecutor's objection in Şırnak and sent to Kocaeli Kandıra Closed Prison. Ferhat Encü met with his lawyers and sent the following message: "Certain judges continue to break the law and issue unlawful decision against the lawful decision given by judges few in number. Şırnak 1st Heavy Penal Court sacrificed law and justice to political pressures and ruled against the decision of Şırnak ins Heavy Penal Court. This scandalous decision has shaken...

ORLANDO, Fla. - Transcripts of 911 calls between Pulse gunman, Omar Mateen and dispatchers were released Friday by the Orlando Police Department. Three calls were made between Mateen and dispatchers. Mateen called first at 2:35 a.m. June 12. Mateen was in the nightclub’s bathroom with several hostages, police said. Mateen told dispatchers his name and then pledged allegiance to the Islamic State. When dispatchers tried to get more information from him, he said he was in Orlando and hung up, according to the transcripts. A man identified only as Andy, a crisis negotiator for Orlando police, called Mateen at 2:48...

A FEMALE jihadi nicknamed the “Muse of ISIS” has been released after serving just four months of a 15-year sentence, due to a technicality. Fatima Aberkan, 55, was convicted of terrorism charges after being linked to Islamic State recruiters and taking her two teenage daughters to Syria. Two of her sons meanwhile have been a part of terror groups in the region for some time now. But her lawyer filed an appeal on the grounds that the court had not come up with an appeal date. Officials were then left with no choice but to release the convicted jihadi and...

ORLANDO, Fla. - Eighteen deputies wrote about their involvement in the Pulse nightclub massacre in a 21-page report released over the weekend. According to the report, 127 deputies arrived at Pulse to assist Orlando Police beginning minutes after Omar Mateen opened fire at 2:02 a.m. Dispatchers sounded a "signal 43" - emergency backup. [READ: OCSO Pulse shooting incident reports] http://media.clickorlando.com/document_dev/2016/06/25/Scan16062511570_1466872698408_7194317_ver1.0.pdf "Prior to the arrival of OCSO deputies... we were informed through dispatch an OPD officer was not responding to their radio after calling 'shots fired'!" wrote Deputy Sergio Uribe. "Several OCSO units arrived on scene and they advised over the...

The chief of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said on Thursday her agency released 19,723 undocumented immigrants last year who had been convicted of crimes, drawing a volley of criticism from Republican lawmakers. In a heated exchange at a congressional hearing into crime committed by illegal immigrants, Republicans grilled top Obama administration immigration official Sarah Saldana. The issue is at the heart of Republican demands for tighter control of U.S. borders and has often featured in rhetoric over immigration in the 2016 presidential election campaign. Saldana defended her record and pleaded for comprehensive immigration reform. "I cannot tell you...

SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- Reddell Smith spent a decade roaming the streets of Syracuse with the 110 Gang, where he dealt drugs, shot at rivals and stole a car at gunpoint. When he was arrested, Smith possessed a 9mm handgun that had been used in 12 shootings. His life as a gangster ended in 2011, when he was sentenced to 8 years and 4 months in prison .... But now Smith and 46 other convicted Upstate New York drug dealers -- some of them members of violent gangs --have seen their sentences cut short as part of a federal initiative to...

The State Department released more than 7,000 of Hillary Clinton’s work-related emails Monday, the fourth and largest such release to date of the former secretary of state’s correspondence. The emails, most of which date from December 2009 to December 2010, include approximately 150 containing information that was upgraded to “confidential” status, the lowest category for classified information. That brings the total number of Clinton emails retroactively determined to contain classified information to more than 210. That is in addition to four emails that the Intelligence Community inspector general determined contained information that was classified at the time that it traversed...

WACO TEXAS – Twenty-five bikers arrested in the May 17 shootout at Twin Peaks have been released from jail since Thursday, when prosecutors and defense attorneys started negotiating the reduction of bonds. Two of those released recently include Sandra “Drama” Lynch, of Mart, and her husband, Mike, a plumber. Sandra Lynch is a well-known advocate for bikers’ rights who reserved the patio for the meeting of a regional bikers’ rights coalition two weeks ago at Twin Peaks restaurant in Waco. The deadly shootout erupted in the Twin Peaks parking lot about 30 minutes before that meeting was to begin. Also...

The Obama administration has confirmed reports that Cuba has released all 53 political prisoners that it promised to free as part of the deal to re-establish diplomatic relations with the United States. “The Cuban Government has notified us that they have completed the release of the 53 political prisoners that they had committed to free. We welcome this very positive development and are pleased that the Cuban government followed through on this commitment,” National Security Council spokeswoman Bernadette Meehan said in a statement. “Our Interests Section in Havana was able to verify these releases. These political prisoners were individuals who...