Free Republic

FRiends, I have been persuaded by a fellow FReeper to post one of our Guardian Angels Patrol Logs to the Free Republic. I do so hesitantly: FReepers are merciless critics and they hold posters accountable to a very, very high standard. I have decided that this is OK: otherwise I would not post to the FR as "DieHard the Hunter". You will judge my Patrol Log by its merits. This is the first contribution, a Pilot. It will either stand or fall on its own. If you like I will post more, and if not I will shut up and...

Nobody at the top is copping to it, but San Francisco police patrolling around Westfield's new megamall say they've been told to make sure the bums don't bother the paying customers. Since the downtown mall opened two weeks ago, foot traffic on the surrounding blocks is way up -- and so, apparently, are the number of street people and street crimes. The cops tell us there's even been a surge of purse snatchings, assaults and other offenses in the BART and Muni Metro stations at Powell Street, adjacent to the mall. Mayor Gavin "Care Not Cash'' Newsom voiced his concern...

The government of Rio de Janeiro state yesterday proposed to build a wall around its sprawling favelas in an effort to help control rampant crime in the picture postcard city. "The wall won't put an end to violence [in the slums] but if we don't contain it, it will destroy the [surrounding] forest, the economy of Rio de Janeiro and the lives of the city's residents," Luiz Paulo Conde, deputy governor, said on Monday. The proposal comes after yet another wave of violence rocked parts of the city during the Easter holidays, shutting down commerce, and killing 10 people, including...

NEW YORK (CNN) -- Jam Master Jay, the DJ of the longtime rap group Run-DMC, was shot in the head and killed Wednesday night in a Queens recording studio, according to New York police. Another man, Urieco Rinco, 25, was shot in the leg and taken to a local hospital, police said. Police are investigating the shooting, which took place inside a studio on Merrick Boulevard about 7:30 p.m. No arrests have been made in the case. Jam Master Jay was born January 21,1965, as Jason Mizell in the middle-class Hollis neighborhood of Queens, New York, according to the group's...

Gun-running is not a term most Huntsvillians would have associated with Oakwood College. A New York Daily News report about a federal investigation into the illegal sale of guns in New York by college students has changed that. Students from three historically black institutions - Oakwood, Clark Atlanta University in Atlanta and Texas Southern University in Houston - have been implicated. At least one student from Georgia Southern University in Statesboro, a predominantly white institution, is also believed to have been in the illegal sale of guns. Dedrick Blue, the newly appointed vice president for Student Services at Oakwood College,...