Free Republic

$50 million lawsuit is being filed against Hoboken and its police department by the parents of a 16-year-old boy who drowned in the Hudson River shortly after escaping from Hoboken Police Headquarters. "He was in the custody of the police department, he was a juvenile and it was their responsibility to maintain his safety and under very suspicious and nefarious circumstances he allegedly escaped and drowned in the Hudson River," attorney Robert Bianchi said. "To this day, a year later, no one from law enforcement has had the courtesy to contact the mother or her attorney to let them know...

Police searched Saturday for three suspects involved in a robbery that erupted in gunfire at a medical marijuana dispensary, leaving one of the gunmen fatally injured The shootout occurred shortly after 11:30 a.m. Friday as employees and the store owner were preparing to open Natural Source and were met by five gunmen armed with semiautomatic rifles. The robbers forced the employees inside, then began taking marijuana and cash, said Lt. Dale Amaral of the Alameda County Sheriff's Department

ROME (AP) - An Italian prosecutor asked a military judge Thursday to sentence 10 former members of the Nazi SS to life in prison for their alleged role in a 1944 massacre in northern Italy, a defense lawyer said. Prosecutor Marco De Paolis made the request during closing arguments at the trial in La Spezia, a city on the country's west coast, said Luigi Trucco, a lawyer for one of the defendants. The defendants are being tried in absentia and are believed to be in Germany, he said. The next hearings were scheduled for Tuesday and Thursday when a prosecutor...

SACRAMENTO — A coalition of media companies and government watchdog groups, reacting to rumors of losses at some big hedge funds, are clamoring to get two of California's biggest public pension funds to disclose more details of their holdings in exotic investments. The California First Amendment Coalition on Tuesday filed requests under the state public records law with the $182-billion California Public Employees' Retirement System and the $63-billion University of California pension and endowment fund, seeking information about debt levels at the hedge funds they invest in. They also ask for data on management fees and types of hedge funds...

The polar bear, an icon of the great white north, is in peril, its icy home melting beneath its paws, an environmental group argued Wednesday in formally petitioning the Bush administration to grant the animals protection under the Endangered Species Act. The Center for Biological Diversity, which made the plea on the day the Kyoto Protocol to address global warming went into effect without the United States, said it did not believe the Bush administration would agree with its 154-page argument. But by drawing attention to the condition of polar bears, it hoped to expand public awareness of the potentially...

A lawmaker is scheduled to introduce legislation today to provide state oversight for Hollywood director Rob Reiner's much-heralded, but yet-to-be-implemented universal preschool program. The program -- funded by Proposition 10's 50-cent-a-pack cigarette tax approved by voters in 1998 -- was supposed to make preschool available for disadvantaged children, but has yet to pay for a single child's education -- despite securing almost $3.5 billion in revenue. The bill is being authored by Assemblywoman Wilma Chan, D-Oakland. Chan was unavailable for comment Monday. A recent state audit slammed the universal preschool program, the brainchild of actor-director and political activist Reiner, for...

The purpose of FreeRepublic.com's multiple message boards is to limit the topics for each board to particular topics. Posting the same message on all the boards defeats the purpose of multiple-boards for special topics. It is very annoying to see the same message on every bulletin board. PLEASE! DO THE READERS A FAVOR. STOP CROSS-POSTING YOUR MESSAGES!

SACRAMENTO – Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger yesterday spelled out a key concession he is demanding from Democrats before signing any resurrected legislation that would give illegal immigrants the ability to obtain driver licenses. "I've already made it very clear that it has to be a different color driver's license so it's very clear it says foreigner or immigrant," the Republican governor said. Schwarzenegger's demand for a different-colored license could be troublesome for Democrats who feel it is discriminatory. They have reluctantly explored less-visible ways to distinguish licenses, such as a different sequence of numbers, a code embedded in the magnetic strip...

WASHINGTON - The CIA (news - web sites) did not have a trained corps of interrogators until the war on terror began and turned in part to contractors to handle the surge of detainees, including in Iraq (news - web sites). Some of those sent in are now under investigation in prisoner deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan (news - web sites). Officials are considering one case as a homicide and have referred it to the Justice Department (news - web sites). In interviews, intelligence veterans who spent decades with the CIA said interrogators are needed mostly during conflicts when a...

Deal Sought in Pakistan al-Qaida Hunt By AHSANULLAH WAZIR, Associated Press Writer WANA, Pakistan - Fighting between Pakistani troops and suspected al-Qaida militants ebbed Sunday as tribal elders said they would try to negotiate an end to the largest battle yet against suspected terrorists along the Afghan frontier. A 25-member council is to begin talks with the militants Monday morning under the protection of a white flag, said Brig. Mahmood Shah, chief of security for the tribal area in South Waziristan province. Pakistani forces took advantage of Sunday's pause in fighting to search nearby homes. The military believes a "high-value"...

<p>Responding to criticism that the state's prison system is beset with corruption and mismanagement, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Monday he'll appoint a special commission to investigate the problems.</p> <p>Although aides said Schwarzenegger announced the move earlier than expected and that details won't be available for several weeks, he said in a talk radio interview that his commission would "really study the whole prison system Â… the overspending that has occurred, why is this kind of corruption going on.</p>

Dealer Gets Life; Ashcroft Sought Death Mon Dec 22, 9:31 PM ET By TOM HAYS, Associated Press Writer NEW YORK - A drug dealer convicted of killing a witness received a life sentence on Monday in a case that drew attention after U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft pushed for the death penalty. The jury deadlocked on executing Emile Dixon, a 33-year-old drug gang leader, automatically putting him behind bars for life without parole. Dixon had no visible reaction. The same jury earlier this month found Dixon guilty of murder and drug conspiracy in the trial's first phase. A racketeering indictment...

<p>Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's top education adviser is calling for a complete and dramatic overhaul of the way California pays for public schools.</p> <p>Education Secretary Richard Riordan said Wednesday that in light of The Bee's recent investigation of school financing, the new Republican administration is expanding its proposals for education reform to include a new kind of student funding formula.</p>

<p>Pushing for sanctions in the wake of a critical audit of the California State University's new computer system, lawmakers on Wednesday asked the state attorney general's office to investigate possible criminal wrong-doing by two senior officials.</p> <p>At a Capitol news conference, legislators said CSU could face harsh repercussions for a host of problems uncovered by state auditors -- including understating computer costs by as much as $312 million, failing to do a feasibility plan before launching into the massive project and ignoring competitive bidding policies.</p>

<p>California Treasurer Phil Angelides called Thursday for the state's two huge pension funds to combine forces in what he calls a ``war'' to clean up corporate wrongdoing and re-establish faith in the financial markets.</p> <p>His goal is to form a single unit that would press for corporate reforms, conduct investigations and scrutinize corporate activities for both the $133 billion Public Employees' Retirement System and the $90 billion State Teachers' Retirement System.</p>