More details emerge in the tragic triple homicides in Minnesota. CBS Minnesota reports:
Police Inspector Todd Milburn said the mother dropped off her child at the house and spoke with someone there. As she was leaving, she saw a man near the house on foot, and something about him raised her suspicions.
The woman called the day care and was talking to someone at the house when the line went dead, Milburn said. She returned to the home and found three people had been shot. She grabbed her child and called 911.
There have still been no arrests in this case.
————————————————————————————————————————————————–
DeLois Brown, 59, owner of Visions and Butterflies Day, and her parents,  Clover Bolden, 81, James Bolden, 83, were all found shot to death in their home Monday morning, reports the Star Courier.

The elderly couple had just moved to Minnesota to live with their widowed daughter last week and reportedly spent the majority of their time volunteering at churches and women’s shelters.
The horrific discovery was made by a woman who had just dropped her 3-year-old toddler off at the home-run daycare. Spotting a “suspicious” man lurking close to the home as she drove away, she swiftly doubled back to pick up her child. On the way there, she tried to call Ms. Brown. Someone answered the phone but the call was ended abruptly. As the mother approached the home, she saw the same man riding a BMX bike.
Upon entering the home, she immediately saw her child — and the three dead bodies.
James Bolden, Jr. said that he learned of the triple homicide when he received a call from his son:
… He said that one of my nieces and my other son had called him and were all hysterical and telling him that something is going on over at the house,” said Bolden. “”My niece said, ‘They’re all gone.’”
L-R: James Bolden, DeLois Bolden, Clover Bolden18-year-old neighbor, Hakeem Hughes, heard screaming coming from the direction of the house at approximately 6:30 a.m. He said that he didn’t pay attention to them because children always play in the area. When he left to catch the school-bus, police told him to go back home because a gunman was in the area. Two colleges were also shut-down while the frantic search continued.
Authorities are investigating the murders and to date have neither leads nor suspects.
A $10,000 reward is being offered for any information that leads to an arrest in this case.

Exd 20:13  ¶  Thou shalt not kill.
 

Pro 1:16     For their feet run to evil, and make haste to shed blood.
 

Eze 22:12     In thee have they taken gifts to shed blood; thou hast taken usury and increase, and thou hast greedily gained of thy neighbours by extortion,

Suspended Guillen addresses Castro remarks

Marlins skipper apologizes to community, says he's 'embarrassed'
Minutes into his five-game unpaid suspension for having praised Fidel Castro in a community filled with, and animated by, people who think Castro comparable to Hitler, Manager Ozzie Guillen of the Miami Marlins tried to explain that he had hoped to say he was surprised Castro had stayed in power so long, and that someone who had hurt so many over so many years was still alive.
The problem is, it turns out he had made similar remarks about Castro four years ago in which he renounced Castro’s politics and called him a dictator and still ended by saying “I admire him.”
 Miami Marlins manager Ozzie Guillen pauses as he speaks at a news conference at Marlins Stadium in Miami, Tuesday April 10, 2012. (AP / Lynne Sladky)
As Rick Telander of the Chicago Sun-Times noted late last night, he interviewed Guillen, the managing the White Sox for a Men’s Journal Q-and-A:
And I asked him this: “Who’s the toughest man you know?’’
His response, which took me by surprise: “Fidel Castro.’’
Why?
“He’s a bull—- dictator and everybody’s against him, and he still survives, has power. Still has a country behind him,’’ Ozzie replied. “Everywhere he goes, they roll out the red carpet. I don’t admire his philosophy; I admire him.’’
That’s an added wrinkle, and it suggests the suspension may be insufficient, at least in terms of length. For some context: over a period of six or seven years, Cincinnati Reds’ owner Marge Schott had said something to offend virtually every group except The Visiting Nurse Association. She said Adolf Hitler “was good in the beginning, but went too far.” She had previously made antisemitic remarks, kept some Nazi trophies from her late husband’s service in World War II (not all that uncommon), bashed gays, blacks, Asians, and supposedly wanted to fire her manager Davey Johnson because he was living with his girlfriend. Major League Baseball – as opposed to just the team acting on Guillen – suspended her for two-and-a-half years and eventually applied enough pressure to get her to sell the franchise.
Flash forward to the remarks to Time Magazine for its newest issue:
“I love Fidel Castro. I respect Fidel Castro. You know why? A lot of people have wanted to kill Fidel Castro for the last 60 years, but that (expletive) is still there.”
As the impeccable Amy K. Nelson live-tweeted from today’s apology news conference:
“Very embarrassed, very sad. I thought the next time I saw this room with this many people, there would be a World Series trophy next to me.”
A predominant response from fans who – correctly, I think – believe we have gotten to the point where we take everything either too seriously or not seriously enough, has been “What happened to Ozzie Guillen’s free speech? What about the 1st Amendment?”
Well – what about it?
Ever read it?
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
That’s the whole thing. In case you think there’s a hidden meaning in there somewhere protecting Ozzie Guillen’s – or your -right to say whatever he wants without consequences from his employers or his community: No.
Translation of the cornerstone of the Bill of Rights, the 1st Amendment to our Constitution to the current mess?
Congress shall make no law abridging Ozzie Guillen’s freedom of speech.
His bosses? They can abridge it all they want.
Ironically, the heavy-handedness of local politicians trying to capitalize on the situation may serve to protect Ozzie. The Chairman of the Board of Commissioners of Miami-Dade wants Guillen to resign, or to be fired. “To say you respect Fidel Castro,” writes Joe A. Martinez, “suggests he also respects dictators such as Hugo Chavez, Daniel Ortega, Adolf Hitler and Sadam Hussein.”
Not quite. Ozzie is guilty of praising (or admiring, or being astonished at, or being appalled by, depending on when you ask him) Castro’s longevity, in much the same kind of way he would’ve tried to praise Jamie Moyer if he threw a 4-hit shutout against the Marlins. But there are third rails, and in South Florida, Castro is viewed as the destroyer of lives, the ruination of the homeland, the man who separated families, tortured opponents, the man who sent would-be refugees to drown or be eaten by sharks, and sent a country back to 1947.
There are survivors, and the relatives of those who didn’t survive, and one of the things they don’t want to hear is that there’s anything good about Castro. And I can’t blame them. You can’t view this exclusively from your own perspective. You need to remember that much of the geographical area the Marlins represent view what has happened to Cuba since 1959 the way Israel views its more belligerent neighbors – or worse.
The usually hip Deadspin was particularly tone-deaf on this:
I’m not Cuban, nor have I ever been to Miami so I don’t know how this played out among that population, but I would just say this…
No, don’t. The 1st Amendment doesn’t protect you either, Bud.
The question remaining is: Is five games sufficient. A local anti-Castro group said yesterday it planned to picket and protest the team until Guillen is out, or Castro leaves office, or both – In which case Ozzie had better hope he has completely misjudged the dictator’s longevity. One assumes a serious suspension would tamp down the fire pretty quickly.
There are a lot of arguments here, but the one to leave out involves wrapping Guillen in the 1st Amendment. It might be nice (or it might be disastrous) if we all had some kind of private immunity from controversial statements, but we clearly don’t.

Jer 2:14     [Is] Israel a servant? [is] he a homeborn [slave]? why is he spoiled?
 

Jer 2:33     Why trimmest thou thy way to seek love? therefore hast thou also taught the wicked ones thy ways.

Black And Latino Neighborhoods Facing New Discrimination From Banks

Three years since a Wells Fargo Bank loan officer shared the details of how she and her colleagues targeted and directed prospective African American homebuyers into taking out expensive high-interest subprime mortgages to The New York Times, racial discrimination in the housing market is still an issue.
According to a new investigative report by the National Fair Housing Alliance (NFHA), a coalition of fair housing non-profit organizations, six major banks are engaging in discriminatory practices in the maintenance and marketing of foreclosed Real Estate Owned (REO) properties in predominantly Latino and African American neighborhoods.
CEO and President of the NFHA, Shanna L. Smith, said in a press release that the report “offers evidence that banks responsible for peddling unsustainable loans to communities of color and triggering our current foreclosure crisis are continuing to damage those communities by failing to properly maintain and market the properties they own.”
The report looked at nine cities and cited “extremely troubling disparities.” For instance, in Philadelphia, PA, 41 percent of foreclosed homes in African American communities were cited with more than 10 distinct maintenance or marketing problems. In contrast, not one property in a predominantly white community was cited with the same. And in Phoenix, AZ, 73 percent of REO properties in Latino neighborhoods were missing a “For Sale” sign. The same could only be said for 31 percent of homes in predominantly white neighborhoods.
Marred by disrepair and neglect, the report goes on to state that the abandoned homes, “degrade the quality of life in these neighborhoods.”
Under the federal Fair Housing Act, it is illegal to engage in discriminatory practices with regards to real estate-related transactions. The NFHA and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development plan to file administrative complaints against the banks in question.
A 2009 report by the Center for American Progress found that among 14 major banks, all engaged in predatory lending practices that targeted people of color. In 2006, a whopping 41.5 percent of African American and 30.9 percent of Hispanic borrowers received higher-priced mortgages than necessary. 17.8 percent of white borrowers received higher-priced mortgages.
Moreover, a study by the Center for Responsible Lending published last year found that borrowers of color were more than twice as likely than white households to lose their homes.
The reason? “African Americans and Latinos were consistently more likely to receive high-risk loan products, even after accounting for income and credit status,” according to the report.


2 Esdras 16:19 Behold, famine and plague, tribulation and anguish, are sent as scourges for amendment.
 

2 Esdas 16:22 For many of them that dwell upon earth shall perish of famine; and the other, that escape the hunger, shall the sword destroy.

Food inflation back on agenda as prices rise Global food prices rose in March for a third successive month, driven by gains in grains and vegetable oils, the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization said on Thursday, putting food inflation firmly back on the economic agenda.

Food prices hit record highs in February 2011 and stoked protests connected to the Arab Spring wave of civil unrest in some north African and middle eastern countries. They then receded but started to grow again in January.
 The index, which measures monthly price changes for a food basket of cereals, oilseeds, dairy, meat and sugar, averaged 215.9 points in March, up from a revised 215.4 points in February, FAO data showed.
 Its Cereal Price Index averaged 227 points in March, up from February, with maize prices showing gains, supported by low inventories and a strong soybean market, the FAO said.
 "You can see prices in the near term rising even further," FAO's senior economist and grain analyst Abdolreza Abbassian told Reuters before the index update.
 The FAO also confirmed its earlier forecast for world wheat output to fall 1.4 percent from last year's record crop to 690 million metric tons (760.59 million tons) in 2012.
 High oil prices have fanned inflationary concerns since the start of this year. Consumer prices in the 17 nations sharing the euro were up 2.6 percent in March from a year ago, despite the region's stumbling economy.
 "The food price index has an extremely high correlation to oil prices and with oil prices up it's going to be difficult for food prices not to follow suit," said Nick Higgins, commodity analyst at Rabobank International.
 Energy prices affect the production of fertilizers as well as costs related to food distribution and farm machinery use.
 "We really saw the (food index) declines in Q4 2011 as being anomalous and related more to sell offs from the threats posed by the European macroeconomic situation rather than agricultural fundamentals," he said.


2 Esdras 16:18 The beginning of sorrows and great mournings; the beginning of famine and great death; the beginning of wars, and the powers shall stand in fear; the beginning of evils! what shall I do when these evils shall come?

2 Esdras 16:21 Behold, victuals shall be so good cheap upon earth, that they shall think themselves to be in good case, and even then shall evils grow upon earth, sword, famine, and great confusion.

Americans brace for next foreclosure wave

Half a decade into the deepest U.S. housing crisis since the 1930s, many Americans are hoping the crisis is finally nearing its end.
 House sales are picking up across most of the country, the plunge in prices is slowing and attempts by lenders to claim back properties from struggling borrowers dropped by more than a third in 2011, hitting a four-year low.
 But a painful part two of the slump looks set to unfold: Many more U.S. homeowners face the prospect of losing their homes this year as banks pick up the pace of foreclosures.
 "We are right back where we were two years ago. I would put money on 2012 being a bigger year for foreclosures than 2010," said Mark Seifert, executive director of Empowering & Strengthening Ohio's People (ESOP), a counseling group with 10 offices in Ohio.
 "Last year was an anomaly, and not in a good way," he said.
 In 2011, the "robo-signing" scandal, in which foreclosure documents were signed without properly reviewing individual cases, prompted banks to hold back on new foreclosures pending a settlement.
 Five major banks eventually struck that settlement with 49 U.S. states in February. Signs are growing the pace of foreclosures is picking up again, something housing experts predict will again weigh on home prices before any sustained recovery can occur.
 Mortgage servicing provider Lender Processing Services reported in early March that U.S. foreclosure starts jumped 28 percent in January.
 More conclusive national data is not yet available. But watchdog group, 4closurefraud.org which helped uncover the "robo-signing" scandal, says it has turned up evidence of a large rise in new foreclosures between March 1 and 24 by three big banks in Palm Beach County in Florida, one of the states hit hardest by the housing crash
 Although foreclosure starts were 50 percent or more lower than for the same period in 2010, those begun by Deutsche Bank were up 47 percent from 2011. Those of Wells Fargo's rose 68 percent and Bank of America's, including BAC Home Loans Servicing, jumped nearly seven-fold -- 251 starts versus 37 in the same period in 2011. Bank of America said it does not comment on data provided by other sources. Wells Fargo and Deutsche Bank did not comment.
 Housing experts say localized warning signs of a new wave of foreclosure are likely to be replicated across much of the United States.
 Online foreclosure marketplace RealtyTrac estimated that while foreclosures dropped slightly nationwide in February from January and from February 2011, they rose in 21 states and jumped sharply in cities like Tampa (64 percent), Chicago (43 percent) and Miami (53 percent).
 RealtyTrac CEO Brandon Moore said the "numbers point to a gradually rising foreclosure tide as some of the barriers that have been holding back foreclosures are removed."
 One big difference to the early years of the housing crisis, which was dominated by Americans saddled with the most toxic subprime products -- with high interest rates where banks asked for no money down or no proof of income -- is that today it's mostly Americans with ordinary mortgages whose ability to meet payment have been hit by the hard economic times.
 "The subprime stuff is long gone," said Michael Redman, founder of 4closurefraud.org. "Now the folks being affected are hardworking, everyday Americans struggling because of the economy."
 "HARD TO CATCH UP"
 Until December 2010, Daniel Burns, 52, had spent his working life in the trucking industry as a long-haul driver and manager. When daily loads at the small family business where he worked tailed off, he lost his job.
 Unable to cover his mortgage, Burns received a grant from a government fund using money repaid from the 2008 bank bailout. That grant is due to expire in early 2013 and Burns is holding out on hopeful comments from his former employer that he might get his job back if the economy recovers.
 "If things don't pick up, I will be out on the street," he said, staring from his living room window at two abandoned houses over the road in the middle-class Cleveland suburb of Garfield Heights, the noise of traffic from a nearby Interstate highway filling the street.
 Underscoring the uncertainty of his situation, Burns' cell phone rings and a pre-recorded message announces that his unemployment benefits are due to be cut off in April.
 A bit further up the shore of Lake Erie, Cristal Fell, who works night shifts entering data for a trucking company in Toledo, has fallen behind on her mortgage a second time because her ex-husband lost his job and her overtime was cut.
 "Once you get behind it's so hard to catch up," she said.
 Fell, a mother of four, hopes the economy will gather enough speed to help her avoid any risk of losing her home. Her ex-husband has found a new job and she is getting more overtime, so she hopes she can catch up on her mortgage by the fall.
 Burns and Fell are the new face of the U.S. housing crisis: Middle class, suburban or rural with a conventional 30-year fixed mortgage at a reasonable interest rate, but unemployed or underemployed. Although the national unemployment rate has fallen to 8.3 percent from its peak of 10 percent in October 2009, nearly 13 million Americans remain jobless, meaning many are struggling to keep up with their mortgage payments.
 Real estate company Zillow Inc says more than one in four American homeowners were "under water" or owed more than their homes were worth in the fourth quarter of 2011. The crisis has wiped out some $7 trillion in U.S. household wealth.
 "We're seeing more people coming through who have good loans with reasonable interest rates," said Ed Jacob, executive director of non-profit lender Neighborhood Housing Services of Chicago Inc, which provides foreclosure counseling. "But in many households only one person works now instead of two, or they had their hours cut."
 "The answer to the housing crisis now is job creation."
 EARLY SIGNS OF UPTICK?
 Zillow expects the resurgence in foreclosures this year, combined with excess inventory of unsold, bank-owned homes will contribute to a 3.7 percent national decline in prices before the market hits bottom in 2013 and stays there until 2016.
 "The hangover from this crisis will far outlast the party of the boom years," said Zillow chief economist Stan Humphries.
 Getting through the remaining foreclosures and dealing with the resulting flood of homes on the market in the wake of the bank settlement is a necessary part of the healing process for the U.S. housing market, he added.
 According to leading broker dealer Amherst Securities, some 9.5 million homes are still at risk of default and in February it said it expected to see the uptick in foreclosures start to hit in March and April.
 There is other evidence that many of the foreclosures that did not happen in 2011 will happen this year.
 A January report by the Neighborhood Economic Development Advocacy Project in New York found that in the first half of 2011 the number of 90-day pre-foreclosure notices in New York City outnumbered court foreclosure actions by a ratio of 14 to one, indicating that while proceedings were initiated against many homeowners, they were left incomplete.
 "Now the banks have a settlement, foreclosure numbers for 2012 are going to be high," said NEDAP co-director Josh Zinner.
 A recent survey by the California Reinvestment Coalition, an umbrella group of nearly 300 non-profit groups in the state, of member agencies found 75 percent of respondents expected increased demand for their foreclosure prevention services in 2012 but more than a third had to scale back services because of funding cuts.
 "Funding is a major concern given what our members expect for this year," said associate director Kevin Stein.
 All this has non-profits intensifying calls for the Federal Housing Finance Agency to drop its opposition to allowing the government-backed mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac it regulates to reduce principal for underwater homeowners.
 Principal reduction involves reducing the amount borrowers owe in order to make a loan modification affordable for struggling homeowners. Republicans and the FHFA oppose principal reduction because of the risk of "moral hazard"- that homeowners who do not need help will seek to abuse largesse and have their mortgages reduced too.

2 Esdras 16:19 Behold, famine and plague, tribulation and anguish, are sent as scourges for amendment.
 

2 Esdas 16:22 For many of them that dwell upon earth shall perish of famine; and the other, that escape the hunger, shall the sword destroy.

Addicts embody cocaine boom in Brazil's "cracklands"

When night falls, street crack marketplaces open for business.
 The gritty transactions of the drug trade take over in city neighborhoods that hum with legitimate commerce by day. Throngs of stupefied buyers crowd around dealers before skulking away behind the telltale glow of cigarette lighters.
 These are not the images that Brazil wants to project.
 Proud of growing prosperity and the millions of new consumers elbowing into the country's broadening middle class, Brazil's leaders prefer snapshots of new houses, new cars and the crane-dotted cityscapes of Latin America's biggest economy.
 Along with the progress, though, has come a surge in drug use.
 Demand for cocaine has soared along with the economy over the past decade and fueled an abundant supply of crack now ensnaring thousands of new addicts. Legions of the addicted roam city centers across Brazil, many of them venues chosen to showcase Brazil's ascendance during the 2014 World Cup of soccer and the Olympic Games in 2016.
 Reuters photographers recently spent 24 hours in eight of those cities chronicling their "cracklands," as the neighborhoods have come to be known. They went from the decrepit center of Sao Paulo, South America's biggest city, to the waterfront slums of Rio de Janeiro. From the Amazonian capital of Manaus, to the colonial tourist hub of Salvador.
 In each, swarms of crack users have converted entire swaths of central neighborhoods into nocturnal encampments doubling as open-air crack marketplaces.
 The images reflect what sociologists, health experts and law enforcement officials say is a rapidly growing problem that puts Brazil squarely in the center of the international drug trade. Demand for cocaine has grown among Brazilians, and in recent years the country has become a crucial path for transit of the drug as it travels from source countries in the Andes to markets in Europe and beyond.
 According to the United Nations 2011 World Drug Report, seizures of cocaine in Brazil have soared, from 8 metric tons of the drug in 2004 to 24 metric tons in 2009. Cocaine seized in Europe, the study said, is increasingly found to have passed through Brazil - totaling 1.5 metric tons of the confiscations in 2009, more than five times as much as in 2005.
 POLICIES NEW AND FEW
 The drugs staying in the country have caught Brazil unprepared, police and policymakers say.
 Aside from the crime increase that accompanies a bustling drug trade, Brazil's already overburdened health system has insufficient resources to treat and rehabilitate the growing number of addicts.
 "There is a lack of management and focus on the problem," said Ana Cecilia Roselli Marques, a psychiatrist and board member of the Brazilian Association for the Study of Alcohol and Other Drugs. "There is no real drug policy at all in Brazil."
 The government, in fact, has little idea just how many users there are. A health ministry estimate suggests 600,000 illegal drug users exist in the country of 190 million people, but some non-governmental groups believe the number is at least double that.
 President Dilma Rousseff pledged from the moment she won office in late 2009 to tackle the scourge head on.
 "We cannot rest," she said in her election-night speech, "while crack reigns within cracklands."
 Last December, she announced a 4 billion-real ($2.19 billion) plan to help crack addicts, calling for widespread education and prevention programs, and more than 13,000 new beds in hospitals and treatment centers by 2014.
 Meanwhile, local leaders have been trying to clean up the cracklands with moves that have been criticized as showy but fruitless.
 In January, Sao Paulo mayor Gilberto Kassab ordered police to clear the crack zone - walking distance from City Hall - in a dramatic days-long showdown that led to dozens of arrests, the confiscation of thousands of crack rocks and the razing of buildings alleged to serve as drug dens.
 Critics blast such efforts as mere cosmetics, noting the temporary displacement of the addicts to nearby areas during the crackdown and their speedy return as soon it stopped.
 "CRACKLAND ISN'T FINISHED"
 During a recent Sunday night visit by Reuters to Sao Paulo's crackland, the trade proceeded unperturbed. Despite the occasional presence of a token police patrol car, whose occupants limited their activities to shooing away assembled users in the middle of the street, the commerce and smoking lasted throughout the night.
 "Crackland isn't finished," said a hotel owner in the area, who asked not to be named, dismissing the recent crackdown.
 Nearby, dozens of users clustered around dealers, squatted behind makeshift pipes or roamed around, eyes to the ground, searching for dropped drugs or valuables to barter or help purchase their next fix. Those who had already scored walked with clenched fists so as not to drop their rocks.
 The crowd, which swelled to as many as 300 people during the night, was a motley collection of age, gender and status: an addict mother trailed by a toddler; a man in a wheelchair; a pregnant teen. A few times, a luxury car passed through, its passengers there for a quick score.
 Because of the rapid, but brief high - and crack's highly addictive nature - addicts sometimes smoke more than a dozen times a day. Though an individual hit is cheap, selling for as little as 2 reais ($1.10), or about the price of a candy bar, long-time users say they are willing to lose everything in exchange for another high.
 "Crack is really good and I don't want to quit," sang one user as he walked by a Reuters reporter. Another offered a cut-rate deal on a cell phone for some quick cash.
 By sunrise, with the sound of shop shutters lifting, the crowd began to disperse. Just as predictably, though, the reverse will happen come sunset.
 "The hours are fixed," said another crackland business owner, who also asked not to be named. "The dealer will come, stand there in the middle and the users all gather around. It's always the same."
 ($1 = 1.81 reais)

Proverbs 16:27
 An ungodly man diggeth up evil: and in his lips there is as a burning fire.

Deuteronomy 28:28
 The LORD shall smite thee with madness, and blindness, and astonishment of heart:

Deuteronomy 28:34
 So that thou shalt be mad for the sight of thine eyes which thou shalt see.

Two of Latin America's deadliest gangs join forces

Hardened in the streets and prisons of California and deported in the 1990s to the Central American countries where they were born, the members of the Mara Salvatrucha street gang swiftly grew into a force of heavily tattooed young men carrying out kidnappings, murder and extortion.
 Now, Guatemalan authorities say, they have begun to see new and disturbing evidence of an alliance between the Maras and another of the most feared criminal organizations in Latin America — a deal with the potential to further undermine that U.S.-backed effort to fight violent crime and narcotics trafficking in the region.
Secret jailhouse recordings and a turncoat kidnapper have described a pact between leaders of the Maras and the Zetas, the brutal Mexican paramilitary drug cartel that has seized control of large parts of rural northern Guatemala in its campaign for mastery of drug-trafficking routes from South America to the United States.
In recent months, authorities say, they have begun to see the first signs that the Zetas are providing paramilitary training and equipment to the Maras in exchange for intelligence and crimes meant to divert law-enforcement resources and attention.
The Zetas, formed more than a decade ago by defectors from Mexico's army special forces, have already joined forces with local drug kingpins in the Guatemalan countryside, and recruited turncoat members of Guatemala's military special forces for operations in Mexico and Guatemala, officials in the two neighboring countries have said.
There is some evidence that other Mexican cartels have paid Central American street gangs to sell drugs for them. And Salvadoran authorities said they are aware of informal links between the Zetas and local cliques of the Mara Salvatrucha paid to sell individual shipments of drugs, but officials have seen no proof of any formal deal between the gangs.
But a formal, durable alliance with the Maras could bring the Zetas thousands of new foot soldiers, extending the cartel's reach into the cities of Guatemala, and, potentially, other countries in Central America where the Maras maintain a grip on urban slums.
Guatemalan authorities told The Associated Press that they believe the Zetas have trained a small group of Maras in at least one camp inside Mexico. Zeta members have spoken of recruiting 5,000 more, although the extent to which they have succeeded remains unclear, officials said.
Surreptitious recordings of jailhouse conversations between Zeta and Mara leaders contain mentions of a deal between the two groups, according to a high-ranking investigator who spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity due to the sensitive and dangerous nature of the information.
Eduardo Velasco, head of an Interior Ministry task force on organized crime, told the AP that authorities believed the Maras' training by the Zetas had manifested itself in the increasing brutality, planning, organization and firepower of Maras' operations in Guatemala.
Previously armed mainly with handguns, Maras, recognizable by intimidating, dark tattoos that cover swaths of their bodies and often their faces, have begun carrying AR-15, M-16 and AK-47 assault rifles and military fragmentation grenades.
In the city of Villanueva in January, a group of Maras armed with assault rifles burst into a suburban disco and opened fire on a meeting of rivals, killing five people.
Maras have also begun chopping off the fingers of kidnapping victims to pressure their families into sending ransoms, a technique previously seen in Mexico, Velasco said.
"As a result of this union with the Zetas, the Mara Salvatrucha have more ability to organize, strategize and maneuver," Velasco said. "The Mara Salvatrucha want to build up their inventory of long-range weapons, grenades and drugs for their own use and for sale ... they know the economic benefit is great for them and that the Zetas, as an outside group, need the Maras' network in order to grow inside Guatemala."
The Zetas have not tried to recruit the Salvatruchas' rival MS-18 gang, also a group whose name and organization originate in the slums of Los Angeles, because it is not as powerful or sophisticated, Velasco said.
The Zetas' ultimate goal, according to analysts, Guatemalan authorities and international officials, is to integrate the Maras into their network and become the most powerful group in Guatemala — criminal or legitimate.
"The Zetas are a paramilitary organization that wants to control all the legitimate, illegitimate and criminal activities in Guatemala," said Antonio Mazzitelli, regional head of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Organized Crime.
Miguel Angel Galvez, a judge who hears narcotics and organized crime cases, said the Mara-Zeta alliance was increasingly evident in the cases he hears, and had been documented in notebooks found on arrested Zetas that detailed payments to Mara members.
"The Zetas come to a group like the Maras and grab total control," he said.
Authorities first learned of the alliance after arresting 50 suspected Zeta members linked to a May 14 massacre on a cattle farm in Peten province that left 27 people dead, 25 of them decapitated, another law-enforcement official said on condition of anonymity for reasons of personal safety.
The suspects were incarcerated alongside Maras, and their secretly recorded conversations contained the first mention of an alliance, the official said.
The Zetas expressed the desire to completely integrate with the Zeta members of the Mara Salvatrucha and are providing them with military training and indoctrination in Mexican camps, Velasco said.
Another operation led to the dismantling of a group of kidnappers, Velasco said. The head of the gang became a cooperating witness and told authorities he had sent 18 members of his group to a Zeta training camp in Veracruz, Mexico, paying each 5,000 quetzales ($640). They came back to Guatemala and worked as kidnappers for him. He was planning to send another six for training when he was arrested.
Velasco declined to elaborate on the case.
Mexican officials have dismantled Zeta training camps in the state of Nuevo Leon but declined to comment on the Guatemalan claims. U.S. officials in Guatemala also declined to comment.

Isaiah 59:7
 Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood: their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; wasting and destruction are in their paths.

Isaiah 51:20
 Thy sons have fainted, they lie at the head of all the streets, as a wild bull in a net: they are full of the fury of the LORD, the rebuke of thy God.

2 arrested in Tulsa shootings Authorities in Oklahoma arrested two people early Sunday in connection with a deadly spate of apparently random shootings in Tulsa that have had residents on edge.

About 30 representatives from four law enforcement agencies -- the Tulsa police, Tulsa County Sheriff's Office, the U.S. Marshals Service and the FBI -- had been working around the clock looking for the person that authorities say killed three people and wounded two others in shooting attacks early Friday.
The police identified the arrested men as Jake England, 19, and Alvin Watts, 32. They were taken into custody from a home in Tulsa.
"We're not exactly sure what their relationship is to another, whether they are friends or extended family members," said Capt. Jonathan Brooks.
The men did not offer any resistance, he said.
The pair will be charged with three counts of murder and two counts of shooting with intent to kill, the department said.
Neither has made a public statement.
 

Both England and Watts are white. All the victims were African-American.
Detectives were interrogating the two men Sunday morning and did not yet know their motive.
"It took a lot of work, a lot of collaborations between several different agencies, and a lot of help from the community," Brooks said about what led them to the men.
"We're very pleased that this is coming to an end, at least this portion of this whole process, but we still have to remember that three of our fellow citizens were killed and their families, on Easter morning, are now having to deal with that," Tulsa Mayor Dewey Bartlett told CNN Sunday.
He said the arrests stemmed from a tip called in to the Crimestoppers network, which led to "some phone calls and some observation and several door-knocking opportunities."
Bartlett said once the media spread the word that tips were needed, "the phone lines really lit up, and it helped tremendously."
The news undoubtedly comes as a relief to residents, many of whom had changed their daily habits since the shooting.
Just blocks from where two of the shootings occurred in the predominantly black neighborhoods in north Tulsa, Philip Hargett moved his trash cans from the side of his home to the front so he would never have his back to the street.
"It's going to be a couple of days for all of us to get over this," Hargett told CNN affiliate KOKI in Tulsa on Saturday night.
His wife, Migdalia, said the shootings "scare the daylights out of me."
Venecia Williams, a mother and a grandmother who lives in the area, said she was afraid because she just didn't know what might happen next.
"That many shootings in one night?" she said. "That's quite a concern."
After the shooting, a survivor described the suspect as a white man, driving an "older" white pickup truck, said Tulsa Police Chief Chuck Jordan.
Brooks, the police captain, said such a truck had been spotted at at least three of the shooting sites around the time of the attacks. It has been recovered.
Police now believe that both England and Watts were in the truck at the same time during the shootings, Brooks said. "It appeared to have been ditched," he said.
The first shooting occurred at 1:03 a.m. Friday. That victim, 49-year-old Dannaer Fields, died at a hospital.
Three minutes later, two other people were shot, authorities said. One of them was "pretty close to the (gunman's) vehicle and the other ... a little further away," said Brooks, the police captain. Those two were initially in critical condition but, by Saturday evening, were expected to survive, he said.
Then, just before 2 a.m., another person was shot and killed.
The body of a third person was found around 8 a.m. next to a funeral home in a more commercial district, though Brooks said police believe he was shot much earlier.
Police have not begun ballistics tests to determine whether the same gun was used in all the shootings.
George Riley, the funeral director at Jack's Memory Chapel, said he was shocked that one of the shootings played out virtually on his doorstep.
"I consider it a war zone," Riley, a Vietnam War veteran, told KOKI. "I don't want to say it's scary, but it can be scary."
In addition to Fields, Jordan identified the other two victims as William Allen and Bobby Clark.
"It appears all the victims were out walking or in the yard," Brooks said. "This (happened in) a residential neighborhood, predominantly single-family dwellings, except for the last victim."
The Rev. Warren Blakney, a pastor at a city church and president of the NAACP's Tulsa branch, said the shootings could well prove to be hate crimes given that they happened in a predominantly black neighborhood.
"For a white male to come that deep into that area and to start indiscriminately shooting, that lends itself for many to believe that it probably was a hate crime," Blakney told CNN.
Brooks said one survivor recalled how "the suspect drives up to him, asks ... for directions and shoots him for no reason." There is no indication the shooter used a racial slur or said anything else that might indicate his motive, according to police.
Jordan stopped short of calling it a hate crime, saying "it's just not time for us to say that."
"Right now, I'm more worried about three of my citizens being murdered," the chief said. "And if it takes us in a direction of a hate crime, that's certainly where we'll go and we'll prosecute him for that as well."
The possibility of a hate crime is "a big concern," Bartlett said. "We don't know if that did happen. I assume that we will, through the interrogation process, find out."
The city pulled together in an effort to locate and apprehend the suspects, he said.
"This is one Tulsa," he said, "and whatever hurts a part of the community affects the entirety of our community."
As for the arrest, Brooks said the department wanted to publicize it as quickly as possible for a reason:
"We wanted to get the word out now so that when people woke up this Easter Sunday morning, they'll know that Tulsa is a little bit safer place."

Obadiah 1:10
 For thy violence against thy brother Jacob shame shall cover thee, and thou shalt be cut off for ever.

Psalm 137:7
 Remember, O LORD, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem; who said, Rase it, rase it, even to the foundation thereof.

Ezekiel 35
 

1  Moreover the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
 

2  Son of man, set thy face against mount Seir, and prophesy against it, 

3  And say unto it, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, O mount Seir, I am against thee, and I will stretch out mine hand against thee, and I will make thee most desolate. 

4 I will lay thy cities waste, and thou shalt be desolate, and thou shalt know that I am the LORD. 

5 Because thou hast had a perpetual hatred, and hast shed the blood of the children of Israel by the force of the sword in the time of their calamity, in the time that their iniquity had an end: 

6  Therefore, as I live, saith the Lord GOD, I will prepare thee unto blood, and blood shall pursue thee: sith thou hast not hated blood, even blood shall pursue thee. 

7  Thus will I make mount Seir most desolate, and cut off from it him that passeth out and him that returneth.

The "Cross Check" enforcement operation targeted criminal aliens and "egregious immigration law violators," officials at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said today.
The operation involved more than 1,900 ICE officers and agents, with assistance from ICE Homeland Security Investigations and partners in federal, state and local law enforcement. Arrests were made in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and three U.S. territories.
More than 1,000 of those arrested had multiple criminal convictions. The most severe cases included murder, manslaughter, drug trafficking and sexual crimes against minors.
The totals included an estimated 50 gang members and 149 convicted sex offenders.
Nearly 700 arrests were of fugitives who had previously been ordered to leave the country as immigration violators but had failed to depart. An additional 559 were illegal re-entrants.
International fugitives from justice were also targeted, including Carlington David Richards, 34, a Jamaican national living in Federal Way, Wash., who is wanted for murder in Jamaica.
The sweep comes nearly a year after ICE pledged to focus on deporting illegal immigrants with serious criminal histories and those who posed national security threats, while going easier on many who stay out of trouble.

Isa 42:22     But this [is] a people robbed and spoiled; [they are] all of them snared in holes, and they are hid in prison houses: they are for a prey, and none delivereth; for a spoil, and none saith, Restore.
 

Eze 22:29     The people of the land have used oppression, and exercised robbery, and have vexed the poor and needy: yea, they have oppressed the stranger wrongfully.

Charles Barkley Goes Drag for Weight Watchers Ad

Former NBA power forward “Sir Charles” Barkley, who oozes masculinity from every orifice in his DNA, decided to show his softer side by donning a sexy black dress for an upcoming Weight Watchers commercial, reports USA Today.
The Weight Watchers promotion,”Lose Like a Man,” depicts Barkley in a sleeveless halter dress and showing off a pair of gams that only a mother can love.  The campaign will try to get the message across to viewers that dropping weight is just not a female thing to do.
Barkley claims to have packed on at least 100 pounds to his 6’6″ frame since he ended his b-ball career back in 2000. He attributed his weight gain to just eating junk food and being a “lazy ass.”  When doctors warned ”The Round Mound of Rebound” that he was either going to wind up getting diabetes, having a stroke or dropping dead, he made up his mind to get the pounds off.
Since he was determined to get most of the weight off, Barkley knew his eating habits had to change. He was well aware that he had to incorporate veggies, which he had an aversion to, into his diet.  Barkley told People Magazine, “Before Weight Watchers,” he said, “I thought vegetables were all nasty! Weight Watchers has me eating cauliflower, brussels sprouts and asparagus, and I really, really like it.”

Jer 2:33     Why trimmest thou thy way to seek love? therefore hast thou also taught the wicked ones thy ways.
 

Deu 22:5     The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment: for all that do so [are] abomination unto the LORD thy God

Man charged after shooting alleged intruder An 81-year-old h

The alleged intruder is charged. But, so is the homeowner, Homer Wright. He faces unlawful use of a weapon charges-- and his neighbors are upset.
 Wright was arrested and charged after the shooting at his Englewood home, which is also his place of business. Wright is a convicted felon and is not allowed to own a gun.
 Wright was released on an I-bond. Many family members were in court supporting him.
 "The judge seen it himself, an old man protecting his family and his home," said Homer Wright's grandson Courtney Cook. "An 81-year-old man is protecting himself and his family. Is he supposed to be the victim?"
 Some Englewood community residents are upset that Wright was arrested for allegedly shooting 19-year-old Anthony Robinson.
 Police say Robinson broke into Wright's home situated behind the tavern he owns.
 "Where in America can you not defend yourself?" said Darryl Smith of the Englewood Political Task Force. "And because you have a felony is your life less valuable than any other person? Had he not had a gun, we would be here for another reason, because he was beaten to death."
 "If they come into your house, whether you are a convicted felon or not, you are going to protect yourself and your family," said 18th Ward Committeeman William Delay.
 Wright has two felony convictions on his record dating back close to 20 years.
 "He has a right to defend himself," said Richard Kling, clinical professor of law at Chicago Kent College of Law. "Had he not been a convicted felon, he would have the right to shoot the person dead. His problem is not the shooting but that he possessed a gun, which he was not allowed to do because of a prior record... He certainly could have used a knife. If he had used a knife there would have been no charges."
 Englewood residents are demanding that state's attorney Anita Alvarez drop the charges against Wright.
 "I don't know that the state's attorney has the discretion to say we are not going to follow (the law)," said Kling. "Maybe the law should change so that, if convicted of a felony, after a certain period of time you are again allowed to possess a gun."
 Kling said he believes there will be leniency in this case. He says the judge has discretion on an appropriate penalty if the case goes to trial.

Psa 94:16     Who will rise up for me against the evildoers? [or] who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity?


  Isa 1:23     Thy princes [are] rebellious, and companions of thieves: every one loveth gifts, and followeth after rewards: they judge not the fatherless, neither doth the cause of the widow come unto them.

A fake 911 call made by Oscar Carillo, 26, led Pasadena, California police officers to kill an innocent college student whom they thought was guilty of robbery, reports the Daily Mail.
Carillo, a Latino cellular store worker, placed a 911 call Saturday night to report that two young African American males had stolen his backpack with a laptop inside of it out of his car. He alleged that they were wearing head-to-toe black. He said one was armed with a weapon. Carillo then changed his story and said both teens were armed. Carillo told police that the boys were traveling on foot on Orange Grove Blvd.

According to Pasadena Police Chief Philip Sanchez, the erroneous chain of events and tragic end result was ignited by that phony phone call and accounts for the mindset of the officers, who wound up killing 19-year-old Kendrec McDade because they thought he was armed with a gun.
When two officers spotted McDade and a 17-year-old unidentified accomplice walking along Orange Grove, they approached them. Reportedly, McDade ran from the officers until another policeman used his cruiser to corner him in an alley. Police said that McDade allegedly made a motion towards the waist of his pants and that’s when they opened fire.
McDade, who was a college student and football star, died as a result of the gunshot wounds. When police questioned Carillo about his phone call to 911, he admitted that his plea for help was partly fake. He said he had made up his story about the suspects being armed in order to speed up police response. Investigators believe that Carrillo knew the two suspects. Carrillo said that he recognized them in part because they patronized the cellular store at which he is employed. As the investigation progresses, detectives have now determined that there are many inconsistencies to Carillo’s story. One thing is clear: both McDade and the other teen were unarmed. Investigators never found a backpack or a laptop on either of the men.
According to the McDade family’s lawyer, Caree Harper, ”His [Carillo] brazen lie triggered a series of events that caused my client’s son to be killed on the street like a dog, and we want justice,” he told the Pasadena Sun. Harper suspects that Carrillo “knew that by saying black men robbed me in hoodies, it would trigger an expedited response from the police department, and he got just that. This man lied about about one thing, so he could lie about another,” says Harper. “There’s so much reasonable doubt you could spread it with a knife.”
The unidentified 17-year-old was arrested and charged with two counts of commercial burglary, one count of grand theft and one count of failure to register as a gang member as a condition of his probation. Harper, who also represents the teen, will request that the youth be released on Thursday.
According to the Los Angeles Times, a security camera video depicts that there were two young men involved in the theft of Carillo’s backpack from his car. Police Chief Sanchez is alleging that McDade was the lookout in the theft. Meanwhile police arrested Carillo on Wednesday and charged him with involuntary manslaughter related to the officer involved shooting.
The case has garnered the attention of the American Civil Liberties Union who are calling for an independent investigation. Religious and civil rights leaders in the area have also demanded to speak to Police Chief Sanchez about the murder. The L.A. County District Attorney’s office is delving into the case and Police Chief Sanchez says his department is sorting through video tapes and audio transmissions.
The McDade case smacks of the recent Trayvon Martin murder, the unarmed teen who was shot to death last month by George Zimmerman, also a Latino, who claims that the boy was armed and a threat to his life.


2 Esdras 2:20
Do right to the widow judge for the fatherless give to the poor defend the orphan clothe the naked

Eze 13:4     O Israel, thy prophets are like the foxes in the deserts.
 

Eze 13:5     Ye have not gone up into the gaps, neither made up the hedge for the house of Israel to stand in the battle in the day of the LORD.

Seven black teens have been arrested on suspicion that they committed a hate crime when they attacked a 15-year-old Hispanic boy while he was walking home from school in Southern California, according to the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Office.

The March 14 beating in Palmdale was captured on video and posted on YouTube, but has since been removed from the site. The seven boys, ages 13 to 16, were arrested Wednesday for investigation of assault and committing a hate crime, Lt. Don Ford said.

The attack happened near Cactus Middle School, but Ford didn't know if any of the teens involved were students there.

The video shows as many as 10 boys surrounding the victim and challenging him to a fight. The suspects then began hitting the teen while others watched.

During the beating, the teens made racially derogatory statements that were captured on the video, Ford said.

After the victim fell to the ground, the assailants kicked him multiple times in the head, knocked out several teeth and left shoe impressions on his skin, Ford said.

The victim was able to get to his feet and escape the onslaught, and will need to undergo dental surgery.

The teens who were arrested were identified from the video, which was discovered by a Palmdale sheriff's deputy and has been retained for evidence. Authorities are not releasing the video.

Police are seeking three more suspects.  An arraignment date has not been set yet.

Deu 28:54     [So that] the man [that is] tender among you, and very delicate, his eye shall be evil toward his brother,
 

Isa 9:21     Manasseh, Ephraim; and Ephraim, Manasseh: [and] they together [shall be] against Judah. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand [is] stretched out still.
 

Mar 12:29     And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments [is], Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord:
 

Mar 12:30     And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this [is] the first commandment.
 

Mar 12:31     And the second [is] like, [namely] this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.  

Isa 9:16     For the leaders of this people cause [them] to err; and [they that are] led of them [are] destroyed.

U.S. Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Ill.) weighed in on the death of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin Wednesday, and said he hopes those outraged about the unarmed black teenager's death will pay attention to "black on black" crime happening in Chicago as well.
Walsh made the comments after his colleague Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.) was thrown off the House floor for wearing a hoodie and sunglasses to protest Martin's death.
Walsh, a member of the Tea Party who is far to the right of his Democratic colleague, agreed that the Martin case was "tragic," but told NBC everyone needs to "take a breath" and wait for an investigation into the Florida slaying to be completed.


 "Congressman Rush was trying to make a point, and that's fine," Walsh said. "It's tragic, a young life was lost ... but let's not persecute George Zimmerman yet until we know the facts."
On Wednesday, Rush told members of the House that "just because someone wears a hoodie does not make them a hoodlum," and began citing Bible passages. He was ultimately escorted off the House floor for violating chamber rules -- which bans the "wearing of hats."
After briefly addressing the Martin issue, Walsh brought up something closer to home for both him and Rush: Chicago violence.
The city has been plagued by violence in recent weeks, with 10 people killed and at least 40 shot the weekend of March 17 and 18 alone -- including 6-year-old Aliyah Shell. The city recently reached the 100-homicide mark for 2012. Chicago had not reached 100 homicides in March since 2004.
"I hope Congressman Rush will be as outraged with all of the black on black crime going on in the city of Chicago weekend after weekend," Walsh said. "This is where our outrage has got to be as well."

Jer 30:14     All thy lovers have forgotten thee; they seek thee not; for I have wounded thee with the wound of an enemy, with the chastisement of a cruel one, for the multitude of thine iniquity; [because] thy sins were increased.

  Lam 1:2     She weepeth sore in the night, and her tears [are] on her cheeks: among all her lovers she hath none to comfort [her]: all her friends have dealt treacherously with her, they are become her enemies.

  Eze 16:37     Behold, therefore I will gather all thy lovers, with whom thou hast taken pleasure, and all [them] that thou hast loved, with all [them] that thou hast hated; I will even gather them round about against thee, and will discover thy nakedness unto them, that they may see all thy nakedness.

The number of minors transporting drugs across the Mexico-U.S. border continues to rise, as does the number of "blind mules" who transport dope without their knowledge, activists said.
In 2011 some 190 minors were arrested for trying to bring drugs across the border, an increase of 13 percent over 2010, according to official figures. Some 33 young people have been arrested so far this year.
These youths are "cheap, plentiful and disposable labor for drug traffickers," Victor Clark Alfaro, a professor at San Diego State University, who also heads the Tijuana-based Binational Human Rights Center, told Efe.

Clark Alfaro said that since the new terminal was built at the San Ysidro Port of Entry, the main crossing between Tijuana and San Diego, his organization has observed an increase in attempts to smuggle drugs across the border using different mechanisms.
While mules are mainly pedestrians, traffickers have noted that for vehicular crossings U.S. Customs and Border Protection now have a lower, slower capacity for making secondary searches, making it more difficult to get through, so they're trying more daring methods.
"We have numerous cases of 'blind mules' in cars. These are people who cross the border frequently and traffickers put drugs in their cars without them knowing it. If they get past the border guards successfully, the traffickers follow them to where they're going to park," he said.
Clark Alfaro said he testified in court recently in the case of one of his SDSU students who said she had gone through that experience after visited her boyfriend in Tijuana and was arrested when they found 35 kilos (77 pounds) of marijuana in her car.
As for the witting mules who cross on foot, what drug traffickers say to convince them are always the same promises - that nothing will happen to them and at most they'll be deported after days or weeks in a juvenile detention center.
"The teens traditionally come from disfunctional families, are paid little money, as in the case of another teenage girl who was stopped on her third trip carrying 4 kilos (8 1/2 pounds) of cocaine taped to her body. For her first two attempts she received $1,000, a tiny amount compared to the drug's street price," Clark Alfaro said.

Drug traffickers tend to pick out youths who cross the border to study, many with dual citizenship, or who travel to see their families or to go shopping, the expert said.
"For those who are arrested there's no second chance, they're just spent cartridges, they lose the documents they need to cross the border," he said.
According to Pedro Rios of the American Friends Service Committee, drug traffickers' favorite places to recruit young smugglers are the high schools of southern San Diego County.
Jer 5:26-  For among my people are found wicked [men]: they lay wait, as he that setteth snares; they set a trap, they catch men.

Jer 5:27-  As a cage is full of birds, so [are] their houses full of deceit: therefore they are become great, and waxen rich.
 
Jer 5:28-  They are waxen fat, they shine: yea, they overpass the deeds of the wicked

Exd 22:18-  Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.

Rev 21:8-  But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.
 
Rev 22:15-  For without [are] dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.

Virginia is for lovers — of guns. Last month the state overturned a 20-year-old law that barred residents from buying more than one handgun a month. Why? Apparently because in Virginia, firearms are like potato chips — you can’t stop at just one.
­Just across the river from the U.S. capitol lies the Commonwealth of Virginia. A state where one can still experience a slice of the traditional American life. It's a place where rolling hills and tranquil farmlands offer refuge from concrete urban jungles. A place where red white and blue is proudly displayed wherever you look.
But here in Virginia, freedom isn't just symbolized by the American flag – but by the barrel of a gun.
“It definitely is a sign of freedom to be able to own one," Mike, a Virginia gun-owner, said on his way out of a popular local gun shop.
And one handgun every thirty days was all that one could buy in Virginia, until last month. In February, Governor Bob McDonnell signed into law legislation that repeals Virginia’s prohibition of purchasing more than one handgun per month. Virginians are now free to buy as many guns as they want.
The law was originally passed in 1993, at a time when Virginia was the gunrunning center of the East Coast. More than 40% of the 1,200 guns found at New York crime scenes in 1991 came from Virginia. The law was intended to curb gun trafficking, but many Virginians felt it curbed freedom instead.
"It’s not anyone's business how many guns I own or how I buy them or who I buy them from," one gun owner told RT. "We have the second amendment for a reason.”
 It's a victory for gun enthusiasts, one that they say gives them more freedom. But for much of the world, Virginia's definition of freedom may seem bizarre.
From tragedies like the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre – the worst mass shooting in U.S. history – to gun battles in war zones abroad, for many people across the globe guns represent violence and bloodshed.
For for gun-owners like Jim Hanson, a Retired U.S. Special Operations Master Sergeant, guns belong in the hands of American citizens.
"The safest person in the world is someone who is legally carrying a firearm," Hanson said. "America is a country that was founded with a basic understanding that guns aren't a bad thing."
There's a famous quote from Clint Eastwood in the popular 1966 Western film, "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly."
"You see in this world there are two kinds of people, my friend," Eastwood says in the film. "Those with loaded guns, and those who dig."
And there are few "diggers" to be found in America, the most heavily armed nation in the world. Americans own more guns, and use them more often to kill each other, than citizens of any other advanced Western democracy. As of 2007, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms reported that there were approximately 294 million guns in the United States, nearly one for every man, woman, and child in the country: 106 million handguns, 105 million rifles, and 83 million shotguns.
And in gun shops all across Virginia, people just cant seem to get enough firearms. Whether its handguns, assault rifles or shotguns, sales are better than ever.
"They are booming," said Dave Rojas, an arms dealer and instructor at the popular Blue Ridge Arsenal. "They are definitely through the roof right now."
And in a country where guns often mean freedom, that trend isn't likely to change anytime soon.
"An armed society is a polite society," Rojas said. "We are here because of guns, as bad as it may sound, but we’ve defended ourselves and we are the free nation that we are because of guns.”
Thirty years after a powerful gun control movement swept the country Americans are embracing guns with a zeal unseen since the days of muskets and militias. For many in the United States, freedom is symbolized by the barrel of a gun. It's Democracy, locked and loaded.

Mat 24:7-  For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom:

2 Esdras 9:3-  Therefore when there shall be seen earthquakes and uproars of the people in the world

Soldier faces 17 murder counts in Afghan killings

Army Staff Sergeant Robert Bales, accused of killing Afghan civilians in a shooting rampage in Kandahar province last week, will be charged with 17 counts of murder, a U.S. official said on Thursday.
 Earlier accounts of the incident, which has damaged U.S.-Afghan relations, had tallied 16 victims, including nine children and three women.
 Bales, a four-tour combat veteran, will also face other charges, including attempted murder, but the official was unable to say how many additional counts there would be.
 Legal proceedings would likely take place at Bales' home base, Joint Base Lewis-McChord, close to Tacoma, Washington, the U.S. official said.
 Bales, 38, is being held in solitary confinement at a military detention center in Leavenworth, Kansas. His civilian defense attorney, Seattle-based John Henry Browne, was not immediately available for comment.
 Earlier this week, Browne said U.S. authorities had no proof of what occurred on the evening in question, and that Bales had "no memory" of the incident.
 Browne, who has defended several multiple homicide suspects, including serial killer Ted Bundy, has indicated that stress may have played a role in his client's state of mind.
 He is expected to evoke post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, as a factor in the trial, a technique he employed in the defense of a Seattle-area thief known as the "Barefoot Bandit." The U.S. Army said this week it was reviewing the way it diagnoses PTSD among troops.
 Browne has said that Bales drank alcohol on the night of the shooting, but not enough to impair his judgment. He has denied that marital or financial problems may have negatively affected Bales, but he said his client was not happy at being sent on his fourth war-zone deployment after three tours of duty in Iraq, where he suffered two wounds.
 Browne has played down the effect of Bales' financial problems, which include an abandoned property in the Seattle area and an unpaid $1.5 million judgment from his time as a securities broker.
 Bales' wife, Karilyn, is being sheltered by the Army at Lewis-McChord.

Jhn 8:44-  Ye are of [your] father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.
 
Wisdom of Solomon 12:5-  And also those merciless murderers of children and devourers of man's flesh and the feasts of blood

Job 24:14-  The murderer rising with the light killeth the poor and needy, and in the night is as a thief.