Five Slain by Gang in Northern Mexico

MEXICO CITY – Members of a criminal gang operating in the northeastern Mexican state of Tamaulipas killed a grandmother and four members of her family after interrogating them about a rival outfit, authorities said.

The Tamaulipas Coordination Group, a federal-state task force, said the killings took place shortly after 9 p.m. Wednesday at the family’s home in La Soledad, a community on the Reynosa-Matamoros highway.

The dead were identified as Vicenta Garcia Sanchez, 65, son Fidel Martinez Garcia, 39, and grandsons Fidel, Alexis and Pedro Antonio, ages 19, 15 and 10, respectively.

Criminals dragged the family out of their home and questioned them about two suspected members of a rival gang, according to investigators. Unsatisfied with their responses, the assailants fatally shot the Garcias and sacked the house, taking a computer, cellphones and other items.

The attackers also took a car and a pickup truck, but abandoned them a few hundred meters (yards) down the road at a deserted residence, the Tamaulipas Coordination Group said.

State and federal police were joined by military personnel in the search for the killers.

Separately, the Coordination Group said that army troops removed 18 clandestine video cameras installed by a criminal organization in Reynosa, a city just across the border from McAllen, Texas.

State and federal forces dismantled a total of 136 illicit video surveillance devices in Reynosa between May 18 and July 8.

The apparent purpose of the cameras was to allow the criminals to monitor the movements of the security forces.

Tamaulipas has suffered from years of violence associated with a turf battle between the Gulf and Los Zetas drug cartels.

Mexico’s federal government launched in May 2014 a new strategy involving a larger deployment of federal security forces in Tamaulipas and a systematic purge of corrupt officers from state and local law enforcement agencies.

California prison riot - inmate found sawed nearly in two

SACRAMENTO, Calif. - Nearly 15 hours after a riot at a Northern California prison, guards found a missing inmate sawed nearly in two, with his abdominal organs and most chest organs removed, his body folded and stuffed into a garbage can in a shower stall a few doors from his cell.

Details of the gruesome May killing at the medium-security California State Prison, Solano, are laid out in an autopsy report obtained by The Associated Press under a public records request.

The grisly discovery raises obvious questions about the prison's security: How could such a gruesome killing happen inside a locked facility with security and surveillance? How could someone obtain weapons sharp enough to dissect a body? And why did it take so long to uncover?

Homicides are distressingly common in California prisons. More than 160 inmates have been killed in the last 15 years, and the state has one of the nation's highest inmate homicide rates. Yet the death of 24-year-old Nicholas Anthony Rodriguez stands out.

Rodriguez's missing organs are "still part of the investigation" at the prison in Vacaville, 40 miles southwest of Sacramento, Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation spokeswoman Terry Thornton said Friday.

Iran - Man killed over a car full of clothes ?

NCRI - At 7:30 pm of Wednesday, July 8, a 30-year-old man by the name of Mohammad Khezri was killed by direct fire of the suppressive security forces in Lamerd, Fars. He was married and father of an infant.

The security forces opened fire on his vehicle that was carrying a few rolls of clothing on the pretext that he was smuggling goods. Mr. Kherzi was injured and he lost his life due to severity of his wounds after being transferred to hospital.

Six days ago, a savage raid by the security forces on Dehsheikh Village in this area broke out into clashes. In that attack that was conducted on pretext of confiscating smuggled goods, including satellite dishes, over 100 people from Lamerd in addition to 40 hirelings from the Special Unit of the security forces were injured.

Killing deprived people on the pretext of smuggling goods is taking place while Khamenei’s close associates and the revolutionary guards are responsible for astronomical thefts and smuggling and resort to plunder people’s property in absolute immunity and liberty.

These plunders that sections of which usually surface during factional fights inside the regime have caused such blemish to the regime that Khamenei and his atrocious head of the judiciary have urged they not be fanned. Mullah Sadeq Larijani said, “Huge corruption files are under investigation, but talking too much about them changes nothing” (News Network state television – June 22, 2015).

Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran
July 10, 2015

Cyber Attack on U.S. Govt Affected Data of 21.5 Million People

WASHINGTON - The cyber-attack, exposed in June, on United States government, allegedly by Chinese hackers, was more severe than initial reports, affecting 'sensitive' information of millions of people, the Obama administration said Thursday.

The Office of Personnel Management, victim of the attack, reported Thursday 'hackers' robbed personal data, including social security numbers and other information of 21.5 million people.

Of these, 19.7 million are people who had applied for jobs in administration or the government and other individuals linked to the public sector, on whom the government ran security checks.

The remaining 1.8 million are families of some of the above.

In addition to social security numbers, the hackers also accessed addresses, financial and health histories.

The 21.5 million affected also include several people who were victims of another "separate, but related" cyber-attack, affecting 4.2 million current and former federal government employees.

The sum of all those affected by these attacks amount to around 7 percent of U.S. population, making it one of the most damaging attacks ever recorded against U.S. administration, both in terms of the number affected and sensitivity of stolen data.

Although, there is no "scientific evidence", voices from U.S. media and politics, suspect a Chinese hand.

According to The Washington Post, "China is building massive databases of Americans' personal information," for "recruiting spies or gaining more information on an adversary." 

Soldier Shot Dead While Guarding Brazilian VP’s Residence

RIO DE JANEIRO – A soldier with Brazil’s Presidential Guard unit who was guarding Jaburu Palace, the official residence of the country’s vice president, died Wednesday of a single gunshot inside the sentry booth where he was working, authorities said.

The soldier, whose identity was not released, was killed by a single bullet about 9:30 a.m. while inside one of the sentry boxes located outside the vice presidential complex, some 300 meters (yards) from the palace, according to a communique issued by the Planalto Military Command.

The command, which is responsible for the Presidential Guard unit and Brazil’s military barracks, said that the circumstances surrounding the soldier’s death were not yet known and it refrained from commenting on whether it was suicide or homicide.

The command said only that the Military Police had opened an investigation to clarify the facts surrounding the death and that it will have 30 days to conclude that investigation and issue its report.

The incident occurred just a few minutes after Brazilian Vice President Michel Temer routinely and temporarily took over as acting head of state because of President Dilma Rousseff’s trip to Russia to participate in the 7th Summit of the BRICS, the forum comprised of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

Jaburu Palace – located near Lake Paranoa and a deserted area between Planalto Palace, the headquarters of the executive branch, and Alvorada, the president’s official residence – was designed by the late architect Oscar Niemeyer and inaugurated in 1977.

14 Arrested for Bombings in Colombia Capital

BOGOTA – Colombian police on Wednesday arrested 14 suspects in connection with a pair of bombings in Bogota that left eight people wounded, President Juan Manuel Santos said.

The suspects are affiliated with the ELN, the smaller of Colombia’s two main guerrilla groups, the president said on Twitter, congratulating police and the Attorney General’s Office on the arrests.

Operations “to find all those responsible for sowing terror in the capital” will continue, Santos said.

Eight people were hurt last Thursday when bombs went off at offices of the Porvenir pension fund in the heart of Bogota’s financial district and in an industrial area west of downtown.

Wednesday’s arrests took place in various parts of Bogota and a nearby suburb, the national police commander, Gen. Rodolfo Palomino, said in a statement.

One of those apprehended is a suspected ELN cell leader known as “El Profe” (The Prof), Palomino said.

El Profe, according to Deputy Attorney General Jorge Fernando Perdomo, “may have some employment connection with the National University.”

Authorities are also looking at the possibility that two of the other suspects are municipal employees, Perdomo told reporters.

The ELN mounted a dozen bombings in the capital a year ago to mark the rebel army’s 50th anniversary and the same group has been blamed for six of the seven bomb attacks reported in Bogota since then.

Colombia’s largest insurgency, the FARC, is in peace talks with the Santos government.

Plenty of Fish - Shootings " Sister sets up sister ". More men shot