A man has been convicted of rape by deception. Let’s leave aside the specifics of this case. It’s from Israel. A Jewish woman had sex with a man who had ”introduced himself as a Jewish bachelor seeking a serious relationship.” Introducing himself this way caused them to have “consensual sex in a nearby building.” It turns out that the man was Palestinian. Not so much Jewish. He’ll now spend 18 months in prison. The issue of rape by deception in this particular case can’t be separated from Israeli politics and the unique situation there, so let’s put this particular case aside and consider rape by deception generally.

The judges in the Israeli case said that the sex was “obtained under false pretenses.” We might wonder how often it is obtained any other way. [Read more →]

Tags: his & hers, on the law
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According to Nancy Pelosi and plenty of other Democrats who get their paychecks signed by Tim Geithner, the source of all this consternation, or at least that which pulsates within their own party, is due to the glacial slowness the Progressive Reform Agenda has taken. Why, we have gone nearly a week without an unread thirty-pound piece of legislation being passed without debate so they do have a point. But when you consult the tea leaves, meaning the polls, there is scant interest in what the Dems are actually proposing. Their hoped for hot buttons have cooled, even among their own electoral base. The time is ripe then to toss a hand grenade, an incendiary, into their tent. I propose here a program based on stated Republican principles addressing the thorny topic of cash reparations to our african-american citizens for slavery. [Read more →]

Tags: money, on the law
3 Comments »

After an overlong absence, I’m back to ruin your day with the most heinous act of police brutality that you’ve seen since the days of Rodney King.

And (gasp!) it’s from Canada …

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Tags: on the law
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We’re still having internet connection difficulties out here, so I can’t write as much as I wish, but I’ve got to try to chime in on the Oil Spill fiasco at least one more time.  I’m particularly distressed about the idea of retroactively raising BP’s liability cap to cover damages beyond what the law calls for.

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Tags: on the law
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The US Supreme Court made a very… interesting… ruling yesterday.

From the Washington Post:

The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that a criminal suspect must explicitly invoke the right to remain silent during a police interrogation, a decision that dissenting liberal justices said turns the protections of a Miranda warning “upside down.”

It’s a very, very rare instance where I find myself siding firmly with the liberals on the USSC [Read more →]

Tags: on the law
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Snoopy suit? Check.

Water pistol? Check.

Wrong prison? Check.

You can’t make this stuff up.

Tags: on the law
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The line of attack against Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan is that she wouldn’t let military recruiters on the campus of Harvard law school back when she was the Dean. Republican Senator Jeff Sessions: “This is no little-bitty matter.” Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich: “I see no reason why you would appoint an anti-military Supreme Court justice.”

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Tags: on the law, politics & government
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Children lie. Not all the time, and not all children. But many experiment with what lies they can get away with. Really, it is when they are children that they learn the differences between right and wrong. Between white lies and something much, much worse — and that not only are there consequences for their actions but also, that the things they do affect other people. Well, what do you do when an 8-year-old girl accuses a 10 and an 11-year-old boy of rape? [Read more →]

Tags: family & parenting, on the law
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If it is true that the greatness of men and nations is measured in the greatness of their enemies, what are we to say of the numberless but talentless hoard sent against us? Yes, truly we can say “sent” now. This week’s Jihadi Jihaderson as much as the Christmas Day Underwear Bomber and the now quaintly convicted Shoe Bomber has demonstrated fandom if not straight employment beneath the ragged parasol of International Jihad. And it is easy and quite hilarious to wonder, is this all they’ve got? The not so hilarious but plain answer is, yes. Yes it is.

For now.

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Tags: on the law, politics & government, terror & war, trusted media & news
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Jack Dunphy, the nom de cyber of a serving Los Angeles police officer, offers a cop’s view of illegal immigrants and the Arizona law on National Review Online.

“I suspect most otherwise law-abiding illegal immigrants in Arizona will have little to fear from this new law,” Dunphy writes. “As few police officers will invest the time and trouble to detain someone who, though illegally in this country, is causing no trouble to the community.”

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Tags: on the law
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Rowen Scarborough at the Washington Times reports that the terrorist suspect at the center of the trials of  three Navy SEALs was one of the most dangerous men in Iraq.

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Tags: on the law, terror & war
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The late great Groucho Marx said that military justice was to justice what military music was to music.

But thankfully we saw some justice when Navy SEAL Special Operations 2nd Class Matthew McCabe was acquitted of charges that he punched a captured notorious Iraqi terrorist.

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Tags: on the law, terror & war
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10. “Can we add something that bars volcanic eruptions?”

9. “Is it just me, or is this legislation getting more complex than some of those derivatives?”

8. “Can’t we blame the whole financial crisis on Obama anyway?”

7. “Any chance we could give ourselves some o’ them executive bonuses?”

6. “Can we put in a clause making Republican lap dances tax deductible?”

5. “What would Glenn Beck do?”

4. “Any chance the Chinese might consider the United States ‘too big to fail’?”

3. “How can we drag this out as long as we did health care reform?”

2. “So which lobbyist is making the highest bid today?”

1. “Didn’t they get their name because they have so much gold, Man, they had to put it in sacks?”
 

Bob Sullivan’s Top Ten Everything appears every Monday.

Tags: Bob Sullivan's top ten everything, money, on the law, politics & government
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I hereby challenge you, dear reader, to explain in plain language the Securities and Exchange Commission’s allegation against Wall Street firm Goldman Sachs. Prizes will include the respect and admiration of your peers, along with that reassuring feeling of a job well done.

Are you game? Good. There’s a catch, of course.

[Read more →]

Tags: on the law, trusted media & news
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My mother was babysitting when a sheriff or sheriff-like official came to the door of my house in Pennsylvania. He was there to serve foreclosure papers to Scott Stein for property Scott Stein owns in New Jersey. My mother told him that Scott Stein — that’s me — wasn’t at home. I don’t know if she mentioned that I was on a rare date with my wife since we had a free babysitter. My mother assured the officer that Scott Stein owned no property in New Jersey. It’s true. I don’t. Never have. Doubt I ever will. The officer disagreed.

He assured my mother that indeed Scott Stein did own property in New Jersey and it was being foreclosed. He wanted her to take the paperwork he had come to deliver. [Read more →]

Tags: on the law
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“A former sergeant who headed a Pennsylvania police department’s sex crimes unit is accused of sexually assaulting a woman inside a township building.” If only this cop could throw a football as well as another man employed in Pennsylvania, he might still have his job.

In New Hampshire, “Liquor Commissioner Richard Simard was arrested and charged with DWI.”

All we need this week is a fire chief arrested for arson and we’ll have the hat trick.

Tags: on the law
2 Comments »

DEFENDANT’S VERSION OF EVENTS:

First of all, I want to say that I very much regret what I did. My behavior that night was inexcusable. Naturally, anyone would have been frustrated under the circumstances, but I should not have urinated in the middle of Sunset Blvd like that. That was wrong and I’m sorry that I did it. Still, after you’ve been standing around waiting for the smug bouncer to let you into a hot Hollywood nightspot, and you’re still outside waiting for almost two hours and meanwhile the bouncer is letting in a bunch of pouting and “brooding” kids from shows on the CW or something, you tend to get a little angry.

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Tags: on the law, politics & government
1 Comment »

Last November 17th, someone shot and killed a 52-year-old man named David A. Masters. He was sitting behind the wheel of his car on Virginia’s Route 1, just outside the Capital Beltway. The Fairfax County police know what happened, but they’re covering up the details of the investigation and not even revealing the perpetrator’s name.

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Tags: on the law
10 Comments »

The headline is “Death penalty for child rapists among bills OK’d.”

People obviously have different opinions about the death penalty, about whether or not it deters crime, whether or not it is acceptable to have it in a “civilized society,” whether or not anyone deserves to die for heinous crimes, whether or not it can be applied fairly and without bias, whether or not it is worth the risk of executing an innocent person, and on and on.

But Oklahoma has a death penalty. [Read more →]

Tags: on the law
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Former presidential candidate and great American hero John Edwards based at least one of his campaigns on the unfairness of the “two Americas” — that there was “one America” for rich people like him, who could basically do whatever they wanted and get away with it, because they were rich; and another “America” for poor people who had to take it when rich people like John Edwards screwed them over. Mr. Edwards had a vision to combine these “two Americas” into one America, where everyone would be screwed over equally by John Edwards.

So far and unfortunately, Mr. Edwards’s vision has gone unfulfilled. And one need look no further for evidence than the Tiger Woods incident(s). [Read more →]

Tags: on the law, sports
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Yup. You read it correctly. Some wasted asshole actually put his baby in an oven and left him there overnight. Talk about giving new meaning to the phrase “bun in the oven.” Congratulations, Larry Long — you are officially our daddy douche of the week. [Read more →]

Tags: family & parenting, going parental, on the law
1 Comment »

“A 40-year-old Racine man is accused of killing a 2-year-old boy, punching him because he was spilling his milk.”

Manuel Garcia “lost his temper with his girlfriend’s son, punching him numerous times in the abdomen on Thursday, killing him.” He “admitted punching the boy at least three times because the child was[…] ’frustrating him’ and spilling his milk.”

We at PWSBKTW understand that two-year-olds can be frustrating. They have terrible table manners. Still, no one should die over spilled milk. [Read more →]

Tags: people who should be killed this week
1 Comment »

We at PWSBKTW know that kids these days are often coddled. They don’t have to work and their parents give them whatever they want. Some parents, though, understand the importance of pushing their children to have a strong work ethic. They know that their kids need skills that are valued in the marketplace, and they demand that their kids contribute to the family’s income. This can only build character. Even 14-year-old girls need character. Fortunately for one of them, her parents gave her plenty of character, good and hard. As wsbtv.com reports:

The couple bought a minivan from a used car dealership in Eastman, about 140 miles southeast of Atlanta, in March 2008 but has not made a single payment on it… They made their daughter perform sex acts on the dealership’s manager in lieu of making the $281 monthly payments on their minivan […] It appears the parents may have offered sex with their daughter to as many as six other adults in exchange for money and drugs…

[Read more →]

Tags: people who should be killed this week
2 Comments »

Parents, if you stay awake at night worrying that one day when your kids go to college they might try to throw a ping-pong ball into a cup of beer, you can rest easy, as long as the college is in Suffolk County:

A Long Island lawmaker hopes to curb underage drinking by banning the sale of booze-themed board games, like beer pong, to minors.

It would be against the law to sell beer-pong sets to minors under the measure proposed by Suffolk County legislator Tom Cilmi.

“I am not one who would typically advocate for regulation of our free market, but this is simply common sense,” said Cilmi. “Our children’s lives are at risk.” [Read more →]

Tags: drugs & alcohol, on the law
6 Comments »

We at PWSBKTW usually describe some particularly heinous act and explain, with wit, when we can muster it, just how terrible the actions of some murderer or child abuser were. We are sorry to say that this week, we have nothing — no sarcasm, no punchlines as we point out who should be killed this week. We have catalogued horrible cases in past columns, managed maybe even to amuse as we shared outrage with our readers, but we’re at a loss for this one. Our column this week probably isn’t even necessary, since by now most readers are familiar with the case and have reached similar conclusions about a just end, but if we’re going to have a column called “People Who Should Be Killed This Week,” it would seem we’d be remiss to not mention the person who perhaps has most earned it. Dr. Earl Bradley is a pediatrician who is accused of sexually assaulting and raping more than 100 children, his patients, over the course of many years, while their parents sat in waiting rooms. Apparently there are videotapes. There is no end to disturbing details. Your day will be better if you don’t read the linked article. There isn’t anything we have to add that isn’t obvious from this column’s title and graphic. A lightning bolt and quick death would be a kindness Earl Bradley doesn’t deserve.  

Tags: people who should be killed this week
1 Comment »

On September 7, 2007, William Eugene Davis shot his two sisters and the mother-in-law of one of the sisters each in the throat, one shot per person, killing all three of them with a shotgun. For whatever reason, it took a year and a half to convict him of the murders. [Read more →]

Tags: on the law
5 Comments »

I hope you were as appalled as I was by the way the Supreme Court basically said “eff you” to democracy with their decision in the “Citizens United” case. Brave Senator Chuck Schumer and brave Representative Chris Van Hollen are doing their part by proposing a new law designed to blunt the effects of said decision, but I am afraid that nothing less than an amendment to our imperfect Constitution will have any effect — the Supreme Court can always strike down a law.  That’s why I, like so many others, have taken direct action by composing a bipartisan amendment to the constitution, designed to protect our democracy (I’m calling it the “Protect Democracy Amendment,” so my intentions will be clear). I’m not exactly sure how these things work, but I think that if enough people sign this proposition it will become an actual Constitutional amendment, in which case democracy as we know it will be saved.

WHEREAS, an informed citizenry is necessary to the perpetuation of our government as it currently exists,

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Tags: on the law, politics & government
14 Comments »

Young children sometimes cry. We at PWSBKTW know that this can be annoying. There are several appropriate ways to address the problem of children crying. This is not one of them:

Thirty-three-year-old Aaron Pace, a friend of the baby’s mother who was babysitting the boy, put Drano on a cloth and rubbed the poisonous cloth on [the] baby’s skin because he had been crying, police said.

Rubbing Drano on his skin was supposed to make the 20-month-old stop crying? [Read more →]

Tags: people who should be killed this week
6 Comments »

Learning is important. Without knowing her ABCs, Joshua Tabor’s 4-year-old daughter doesn’t have much of a chance to get ahead in life. Or learn how to spell. So why aren’t people commending Tabor’s efforts to stress the importance of education in his home? It could be because he and his girlfriend held his daughter’s head under water when she refused to say her ABCs. [Read more →]

Tags: education, family & parenting, on the law
2 Comments »

300 of these Filipino inmates are awaiting trial for murder and the others have been incarcerated for three years or less. Sure… why not make them famous. I understand that this formalized recreation has improved conditions in the prison ten-fold, but I am not sure I like the fame attached to it all. Still… the video is kind of amazing.

See more videos (oh, and there are a lot more videos) and explanations about how this all started on Byron Garcia’s You Tube channel.

Via PopEater

Tags: art & entertainment, on the law
1 Comment »