Free Republic

The three-week-old Israel-Hamas war has sparked protests by some high school students in Fairfax County, Virginia. Students, with their principals’ permission, have been walking out of classes for brief rallies on school grounds. Scores of students at Mount Vernon High School crowded the school’s main plaza at 1:30 p.m. Wednesday and spent a half-hour chanting and rallying for the Palestinian people, especially the children. The students hoisted homemade signs and unfurled the Palestinian flag. There was a similar student protest earlier in the day at Edison High School. Other student rallies are expected Thursday at Woodson and Falls Church high...

Dashcam video captured the terrifying moment an out-of-control BMW careened across four lanes of traffic and a highway median in Virginia at more than 120 miles per hour, nearly hitting a cop. The heart-stopping incident happened late Monday morning in suburban Fairfax County as an officer was making a routine traffic stop on the southbound Fairfax County Parkway, about 20 miles away from Capitol Hill, officials said. All of a sudden, a black 2018 BMW M3 driven by a 17-year-old and headed northbound on the parkway, lost control, spun around and dashed across traffic, slamming into both the car that...

A progressive Virginia prosecutor this year dropped charges against a felon with a history of gun charges. Months later, that felon killed two innocent men. In July, Francis Rose shot two "innocent bystanders" in the head while robbing an apartment complex in Alexandria, Va., according to police. In February, he was freed from jail by the office of Arlington County commonwealth’s attorney Parisa Dehghani-Tafti (D.). Rose, who was already on probation for illegally carrying a weapon in Washington, D.C., was arrested in October 2020 for possession of a firearm and possession of cocaine and fentanyl with intent to distribute. The...

A 20-year-old Triangle man who was fatally shot last month by a Dale City woman in what police determined was a justified act of self-defense has been connected to five recent armed robberies at area 7-Eleven stores, police said Monday. The man, identified as Azhar Laurent Smart, 20, of Triangle, was found by police suffering a gunshot wound at 12:25 a.m. on Thursday, July 22, outside a home in the 4100 block of Hoffman Drive, a residential area off Prince William Parkway near the Sheetz gas station, according to a news release issued at the time. Smart was shot by...

Virginians for Safe Communities launch effort to put 'pro-criminal prosecutors on trial' As homicides rise in Virginia's northern suburbs, voters will have the opportunity to put three liberal prosecutors backed by billionaire Democratic megadonor George Soros on trial. A new Virginia nonprofit, Virginians for Safe Communities, is launching a campaign to recall Fairfax County's Steve Descano, Loudoun County's Buta Biberaj, and Arlington County's Parisa Dehghani-Tafti from their respective offices, the group announced in a Monday statement. The progressive attorneys took office in January 2020 after Soros spent more than $2 million supporting their campaigns. All three have since implemented lenient...

Northern Virginia, the state’s economic engine, is nowhere near ready to reopen Friday when Gov. Ralph Northam plans to begin lifting shutdown restrictions, the region’s top elected officials said Sunday, citing the continuing increase in coronavirus infections and hospitalizations. In a joint letter, the elected leaders in Northern Virginia’s five largest jurisdictions — representing nearly 2.4 million residents — told Northam (D) they are unwilling to lift restrictions in place since late March, which the governor plans to do in a limited capacity Friday in hopes of reviving the state’s ailing economy. Northam announced last week that he will begin...

A controlled burn occurring at Marine Corps Base Quantico Sunday afternoon near the Stafford and Fauquier county line is causing moderate to heavy smoke conditions in Prince William County and other areas of Northern Virginia, Maryland and D.C. The U.S. Forest Service is conducting the controlled burn of about 2,000 acres in the area. Individuals with respiratory illnesses or medical conditions that are aggravated by smoke should remain indoors until smoke conditions clear, according to the Prince William County Police Department. The controlled burn is expected to last two days. The controlled burn appears to have caught local jurisdictions off...

A man has been sentenced to life in prison for raping and killing a Muslim teenager as she walked back to a mosque with friends for pre-dawn religious services. The life sentence without possibility of parole imposed Thursday on Darwin Martinez-Torres of Sterling was a formality after his guilty plea last year in the June 2017 slaying of 17-year-old Nabra Hassanen of Reston. That plea bargain required a life sentence but eliminated a potential death penalty. Hassanen's death received widespread attention amid concerns her slaying was motivated by anti-Muslim sentiment. But prosecutors say Martinez-Torres attacked her after he got out...

In a Northern Virginia swing district that is one of the most watched in this midterm election, one-quarter of the electorate can’t really say what they think of state Sen. Jennifer Wexton. But in most polls, the Democrat is comfortably ahead of Rep. Barbara Comstock, the two-term Republican who is ubiquitous. That phenomenon says plenty about this particular moment in this particular suburban district across the river from Washington, heavy with college-educated, affluent voters and growing immigrant communities. Voters in Virginia’s 10th Congressional District say they want to vote for a Democrat — any Democrat — as a check on...

Twenty-nine of the top 30 areas with the most million-dollar homes are in California or NYC's Tri-State Area. Eight of the ten wealthiest towns are in California and New York State. Forty percent of the nation's billionaires live in California, New York State, and Connecticut. But the Washington, D.C., area dominates the list of highest-earning counties, claiming six of the top ten and 13 of the top 30. Why?

There’s a famous old fable known as “Belling the Cat.” For those who haven’t heard it, it goes like this: A bunch of mice are threatened by a vicious cat, and they call a council to figure out how to solve the problem. One mouse proposes that they place a bell around the cat’s neck. That way, they’ll hear the cat approaching and have plenty of time to run and hide. The mice applaud the plan. They love the plan. It’s a great plan. One mouse asks who’s going to volunteer to place the bell around the cat’s neck. Suddenly,...

Islamic leaders tied by federal investigators to the radical Muslim Brotherhood in America – including one under active investigation for alleged terror-financing – have recently donated to Sen. Barack Obama's campaign for president, according to Federal Election Commission records reviewed by WND. Jamal M. Barzinji earlier this year gave Obama $1,000, a gift that records show has not been returned. Other Democratic candidates, including Rep. Jim Moran, have refunded donations from Barzinji since federal agents raided his Virginia home and offices in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Obama's top Muslim adviser resigned earlier this month over controversy surrounding his...

A Saudi national who served as director of the Virginia office of the Muslim World League (MWL) has been deported by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents on immigration charges. ICE spokesman Dean Boyd said Abdullah Alnoshan, 44, of Falls Church, was returned to Saudi Arabia over the weekend. He was arrested in July by ICE and FBI agents assigned to the Joint Terrorism Task Force. A criminal complaint charged Alnoshan with conspiring to commit immigration fraud by using fake employment documents to enter, exit and live in the United States. Alnoshan also was accused of seeking to deter...

A knife-wielding attacker posed as a law enforcement officer to get inside a Virginia home, stabbed the residents multiple times then told them he'd be back to finish the job as his wife waited outside, prosecutors said. The suspect, 31-year-old Andrew Schmuhl, was wearing nothing but a diaper when he was apprehended after a car chase, authorities said Friday. These and other disturbing details emerged during a bond hearing for Schmuhl's wife, 30-year-old Alecia Schmuhl, Friday morning. The Schmuhls, both lawyers, are accused in the attack of a couple in their 60s. Police have said the attack apparently stemmed from...

Commuters got quite a distraction from rush hour traffic Friday on Prince William Parkway near Interstate 95 – a naked man jumping on the hood of a car. Yes, you read that right. Police said the man was on the I-95 overpass near the commuter lot, and was quickly arrested. One witness on InsideNoVa’s Facebook page said others drivers couldn’t miss it. “He was bouncing up and down and I swear … smacking the middle of his chest,” the witness wrote. Prince William police spokesman Jonathan Perok said the man was under the influence of narcotics and “acting irrational.” The...

A few years ago, Alaska’s proposed “Bridge to Nowhere” became a national symbol of wasteful government spending on little-needed projects. Now Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) has pushed through his own version of this embarrassment, a $1.4 billion highway outside Hampton Roads that qualifies as a “Road for Nobody.” McDonnell has perplexed people across the state by his insistence on adding a tolled, four-lane highway parallel to U.S. 460. It will stretch for 55 miles from Petersburg, a Richmond suburb, southeast to Suffolk. The deal signed in December to build the road is especially insulting to traffic-jammed Northern Virginia, where...

Virginia officials reacted with bipartisan dismay on Monday to Defense Department budget shifts that will cost the state thousands of jobs in coming years and will dramatically impact the economies of the Norfolk area and Northern Virginia. Most of the immediate reaction revolved around Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates's proposal to close the U.S. Joint Forces Command. It is a major employer in Hampton Roads, including Norfolk and Virginia Beach, whose elimination could translate into the loss of 6,100 military, civilian and contractor jobs in the region. But a proposal to slash the Pentagon's budget for military contractors over the...

NOTE The following text is a quote: Virginia Man Accused of Providing Material Support to Terrorists ALEXANDRIA, VA—Zachary Adam Chesser, 20, of Fairfax County, Va., was arrested today on charges that he provided material support to al Shabaab, a designated foreign terrorist organization. Neil H. MacBride, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, and Shawn Henry, Assistant Director in Charge (ADIC) of the FBI’s Washington Field Office, made the announcement after Chesser was arrested and the charging documents were made public. “This case exposes the disturbing reality that extreme radicalization can happen anywhere, including Northern Virginia,” said U.S. Attorney...

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Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine (D) denied clemency for John Allen Muhammad on Tuesday, clearing the way for the sniper to be executed by lethal injection at 9 p.m. and putting an end to one of the most trying local criminal cases in U.S. history. Muhammad, 48, was convicted of capital murder in the slaying of Dean Harold Meyers on Oct. 9, 2002, at a gas station outside of Manassas, part of a spree that left 10 people dead in the Washington area and included shootings in several other states. A jury in Virginia Beach, where the trial was moved...