Chicago ( Gang members battle on basketball court - thanks to a determined priest. )

While Chicago is no stranger to violent crime, since the beginning of the year, crime citywide has gone down.

As of Aug. 3, Chicago Police said murders have gone down 26 percent from 317 murders at this time in 2012 to 235 murders so far this year.
"While to date we've had fewer shootings and significantly fewer murders this year than any year since 1965, there's more work to be done and we won't rest until everyone in the city enjoys the same sense of safety," Chicago Superintendent Garry McCarthy said.


And one Chicago neighborhood seems to be escaping the bloodshed thanks to a determined priest.
Rival gang members are battling on the court instead of on the streets -- with the prize not being a trophy, but lives saved.
"Nobody wins in a shootout. We are trying to create an atmosphere that when something comes up and we to talk it out rather than shoot it out," Father Michael Pfleger said.
Pfleger started an ongoing weekly basketball league last fall in one of Chicago's most dangerous neighborhoods.
As a result, violence is dramatically down in the community.
Pfleger said among his players, there hasn't been a single shooting. He has received calls from four other gangs who want to become part of the tournament and encourage peace.
The players promise to give up their violent ways and in exchange for Pfleger helping them get a GED, job training, and even job placement at one of 100 companies that have partnered with the tournament.
"These guys are committed because we say to them, 'you go back to shooting, the job's gone,'" Pfleger said.
In October 2012, ABC News hosted a summit, moderated by "World News" anchor Diane Sawyer and ABC News correspondent Alex Perez, to bring some of the city's gang members, former gang members, victims and community organizers together to talk about the spread of gang violence, why it happens and how to stop it.
That was also when ABC News talked to a 7-year-old boy named Ralph, who lost his grandmother to the gang violence last year.
He showed ABC News the fortress of locks and barricades he and his mother Deliah lived behind just to feel safe.
"It'll be gang bangers running and shooting," Ralph said at the time.
Ralph and his mother thought their prayers were answered when they moved to a new apartment to escape the violence. But it turned out to be even worse.
Read: Chicago Gang Violence: Victims, Families Share Stories
Drug deals were happening right in their apartment building with customers exchanging cash for drugs through a tiny hole, he said.
"These drug dealers and gang bangers make it hard on me and hard on kids," Ralph said.
Pfleger stepped in and helped Ralph and Deliah move to his neighborhood -- giving a tired little boy a chance to dream and an entire community reason to hope.
"The frustrating thing is that all these lives out here on this court, they have so much potential," Pfleger said. "We need their leadership, we need their skills and as I always say: brush the dust off their dreams, help them achieve their purpose, that's our job."
Anyone wanting to help Pfleger's church and Ralph can go to: http://www.thebelovedcommunitychicago.org/

Arizona ( Immigration activists known as the DREAM 9 - Being held at ELOY prison in arizona )

CHICAGO – The National Immigrant Justice Center urged the Department of Homeland Security on Friday not to hold in solitary confinement the nine immigration activists known as the DREAM 9.

The NIJC’s executive director, Mary Meg McCarthy, cited press accounts indicating that the young people were in solitary last week and that at least two of them are still in that situation.

“(S)olitary confinement should never be used to retaliate against individuals who speak out for their rights inside detention,” she said in a statement.

“If the government feels it cannot safely maintain custody of individuals who are demanding their rights but who pose no threat to the community or flight risk, then the humane solution is to release them from detention,” McCarthy said.

The activists entered the United States from Mexico on July 22 at the Port of Entry in Nogales and requested humanitarian parole as “DREAMers” – named after the proposed DREAM Act that would legalize undocumented youths who were brought to the country as children – who should never have been deported or forced to leave.

Some of them had been deported, others returned to Mexico voluntarily and three decided to go visit family members after being approved for Deferred Action, which provides a work permit and avoids deportation but does not authorize leaving the United States.

The group is waiting at Arizona’s Eloy Detention Center for a response to their request for political exile.

The DREAM 9 would have joined the 300 people who are kept in solitary confinement every day in the immigration detention system, the NIJC said.

“There is growing agreement by the medical and corrections establishment that solitary confinement is psychologically harmful, and the United Nations has called solitary confinement that extends beyond 14 days torture,” McCarthy said. EFE

BRAZIL ( Brazilian Police take man in for questioning - Then he disappeared ) Human wrongs

BRASILIA – Brazil’s human rights minister said Friday that personnel at a Rio de Janeiro police precinct are the chief suspects in the disappearance of a construction worker who has not been seen since cops picked him up on July 14.

“The investigation should be pursued with the clear and concrete hypothesis that the responsibility lies with the public agents,” Maria do Rosario Nunes told reporters in the capital.

Amarildo Souza, 42, disappeared after police at a precinct in the Rio shantytown of Rocinha mistook him for a local drug trafficker and took him in for questioning.

What most concerns the government is that Souza’s disappearance followed an encounter with police, Nunes said.

“Police abuse and violence is something we can no longer co-exist with,” the human rights minister said, citing the situation in the central state of Goias, where an “immense number” of people have gone missing after being taken into custody by cops.

Hundreds of people turned out on Thursday in Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo to demand answers in the Souza case, which prosecutors are treating as a homicide.

The case has also joined the list of grievances raised by participants in nationwide demonstrations that began in June.

Spurred by an increase in transit fares, the protests became increasingly focused on the poor quality of public services, rampant political corruption and the spending of large amounts of taxpayers’ money to host high-profile events such as next year’s soccer World Cup and the 2016 Olympics. EFE

Texas ( Two texas women molested by a Female Texas Trooper -see video )

Puebla ( Citizens make thief walk " Naked through town " holding a sign )

Published at 2:29 pm EST, August 2, 2013

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Photo: Thief Stripped and Paraded thru town

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In Puebla yesterday, as a punishment, a man was stripped and paraded throughout the center of this town carrying a huge poster that said “thief”. He was caught and apprehended by locals.
Although authorities did not release the identity of the suspect, it is known that he was caught yesterday trying to steal merchandise valued at several thousand pesos that was loading the merchandise onto a truck.
After hearing what happened and fed up with the crime in the area, owners from different businesses and even some locals joined together and decided it would waste too much time to go to the police and then to the prosecutor. They chose to chastise him in an unusual and embarrassing way.
The people chose to take off his clothes and began to walk him by the town Center wearing a sign that said “Know me- I am a thief”.
An eyewitness who requested anonymity reported everything above.
Read more in Spanish here

Honduras ( American Businessman Kidnapped in Southern Honduras )

 Published at 3:08 pm EST, August 3, 2013

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Photo: Honduran police (Infosurhoy.com)

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A U.S. businessman was kidnapped Friday in southern Honduras, a source in the National Police told the media.
Peter Jackson, who owns a hotel in the northern city of San Pedro Sula and shrimp fisheries in Choluteca, was snatched by armed assailants who intercepted his vehicle on a road in the San Bernardo district.
The two people traveling with Jackson were found tied-up inside the businessman’s vehicle about 5 kilometers (3 miles) from the scene of the abduction, the police source said.
Honduran police and soldiers are cooperating with the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa in the investigation, the source said.
“The embassy always has a duty toward its own citizens,” U.S. Ambassador Lisa Kubiske told reporters in San Pedro Sula.
Persistently high levels of violence in Honduras compel the State Department to maintain the alert issued June 17 warning U.S. citizens about the dangers of traveling to the Central American country, Kubiske said.
Honduras suffered 85.5 homicides for every 100,000 residents in 2012, compared with a global median rate of 8.8 murders per 100,000, the Violence Observatory at the National Autonomous University said in a study released in February.
The number of homicides in Honduras has grown by nearly 233 percent over the past nine years.

Sports News ( Oh thats what those " ponytails " are for ) Hmm